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Chapter 201
Chapter 201 - Cavalry Maneuvering
Zhang Yang's face paled, seeing two of his battalions got slaughtered by an ambush.
"Ambush!"
"The enemies are on the cliff!"
The surviving soldiers scrammed away from the eastern cliff in a panic. Ninety percent of the men in the ambushed platoons were either crippled or dead by the continuous arrow rain.
Zhang Yang screamed, "Get away from the cliff! Have the scouts look for a pathway to the top of the mountain! Heavy cavalries, head back to help the reserve troops!"
Finished sending orders, Zhang Yang bit his thumb while he was sweating bullets despite the cold temperature. He regretted not noticing the strategic terrain around his own city.
He was just appointed as the governor of Shangdang recently to help Ding Yuan suppress the Xiangnu tribes in Bing Province. Because Zhang Yang was too focus on collecting wealth, slaves, and expanding his influence in this city to make it his permanent root, he did not pay attention to the surrounding geography around his territory.
Zhang Yang always believed that there would not be any crazy bastard who would siege his city as it was closed to the Capital. The warlord would be branded as rebels if he dared to do so.
Alas, his prediction was wrong. Jia Xu and Ju Shou were those crazy bastards to come up with this plan.
The arrow barrages did not last long. It stopped after half a minute, but the damages it caused was significant as it withered down Zhang Yang's personal force by almost 20%.
Feeling impatient, Zhang Yang decided to head toward his heavy cavalry unit. He would join them in the hunt. Before he left, he called a messenger and told him.
"Tell Wang Kuang, I'll give him my right to command my army, but I want him to siege the city, NOW!"
...
...
Lu Bu observed the entire event from start to finish. He shook his head as he disapproved Zhang He's style of fighting.
"What a disappointment. He's just another coward."
Li Feihong rolled his eyes. Gao Shun let out a dry laugh, and Zhang Liao put his palm on top of his forehand. They did not agree with Lu Bu as it was a logical choice to use a hit-and-run tactic against an overwhelming force.
Yet, their boss was the abnormal one.
'Who in the right mind would fight directly against a 100, 000-man army with only a few thousand men?' Gao Shun retorted in his mind.
'Not everybody has your brute strength, damn you, ' Li Feihong thought.
'He would have been on the legendary Xiang Yu's level if he was a bit more open-minded, ' Sighed Zhang Liao.
Fortunately, Lu Bu could not read a human's mind. If he could hear what his subordinates' thought, he would have beaten them black and blue.
"You are wrong, Fengxian. Look carefully, they are back, aren't they?"
Zhang Liao pointed at the light horsemen that were rushing down from the same slope again.
...
...
Mu Shun, the commanding general of Zhang Yang, led the heavy cavalry unit to follow the trail of Zhang He and his men. By the order of Zhang Yang, Mu Shun took all 30, 000 heavy cavalries from both Wang Kuang and Zhang Yang Army to chase after the raiders.
Zhang Yang also tagged along with the troop, wanting to revenge for the losses of his men.
Mu Shun had sent a scout team to follow the footprints beforehand, and they found out that Zhang He had fled north. It took them thirty minutes to locate a suspicious path. Among the eastern mountain range of the valley road, there was an area where bushes and glasses did not grow, which was similar to a road in a forest.
"General, look! They have passed through this passage here!" Mu Shun pointed at the ground. Several footprints of horses could be seen by naked eyes."The path is wide, and the footprints are still fresh. They should have passed through here a moment ago!"
Zhang Yang nodded, "We'll follow them!"
...
Meanwhile, Zhang He gazed at the pursuers from the top of the cliff on a distance away. His pupils expanded as if they were the eyes of a cat when it's looking at a toy.
'Catch me if you can!'
Zhang He decided to not fight with this group of heavy cavalries. Although he was running away from them, he had not finished what he had come here to do yet.
The 10, 000 light cavalries gathered at the slope where they charged down from the top of the cliff again. Zhang He returned to his men after brief scouting as he had thought of a new plan.
"Men, we'll rush down the mountain again!"
The previous soldiers, who had followed Zhang He down the mountain, grinned as they enjoyed the sensation of galloping a horse downhill. However, the others looked at Zhang He with a wry smile.
One of the experienced soldiers patted the shoulder of a horseman who had yet to try, "Don't worry. It's scary at first, but you'll like it once it passes. It's like giving your butthole to a man for the first time."
The others turned around and locked their eyes at the speaker in fright and shock.
"It's like what!?"
"You slept with a man!?"
"Don't you dare to sleep in my tent!"
"Don't worry, you can always sleep in my private tent. But we'll sleep naked, of course."
"Dafuq was wrong with you two!"
"Go get a room, both of you."
The soldiers still messed around with their comrades. They did not have the tension of being on a battlefield.
Zhang He grinned as he did not mind them. It was a good sign that they were not nervous anymore, and the morale was high.
"Men, let's go! Charge with me again!"
The ten thousand horsemen charged down the slope again. Because of the previous battle, there was nobody below the cliff, which gave Zhang He a golden opportunity to adjust the formation.
Zhang He rearranged the battalions into ten groups, a thousand horsemen per one unit. Each unit had a call sign of [Ghost One] to [Ghost ten] in order.
"We'll flank the enemies since the heavy cavalries are not there anymore. All units, follow me!"
Ten units of light horsemen rushed south toward the Imperial Army in front of the gate. It took them only a couple minutes to see the dense crowd of soldiers, turning their back at them. Their attention was on the wall as both Imperial armies were attacking Shangdang north gate at the moment.
"All units, form wedge formation. Five units, Ghost Six to Ghost Ten, stand by for order. Ghost One to Ghost Five, charge with me!"
Five thousand men and five wedged shaped formation rushed at the defenseless Imperial soldiers who revealed their back at them. The galloping sound of horse hooves echoed in the valley.
"What's that sound?"
"Isn't that our cavalry?"
The soldiers turned around to look back.
"That's not our allies! ENEMY ATTACKS!"
However, they were too late to react as Zhang He and his five thousand men were already 50 meters away.
*BANG*
*POEK*
*SOEK*
Each unit of 1, 000-man dove into a square formation of 5, 000 infantries. The five thousand men boldly collided with 25, 000 footmen without fear.
The horses crashed with the soldiers, running them over. The spears of the horsemen pierced the unprepared men through their armors. Unlike the last time where Zhang He managed to charge 300 meters before he lost the momentum, the cavalries only managed to rush 10 meters and break half of the formation because they were stopped by the dense crowd.
*BWOOOH*
Zhang He did not hesitate to blow the horn and order his men to retreat.
"Withdraw! Scatter to the side and regroup at our previous position!"
*BWOOOH*
The horn was blown again.
"GHOST SIX, SEVEN, EIGHT, NINE, TEN, CHARGE!!" Zhang He shouted with all the air in his lung while he galloped back with his men.
The standby troops on the back rushed in as they were called. The five thousand horsemen followed what the previous chargers did, running into the wrecked enemy formations.
This time, the formation collapsed as the horsemen brokethrough their lines and columns.
*BWOOOH*
"GHOST SIX TO TEN, WITHDRAW BACK AND REGROUP! GHOST ONE TO FIVE, FORM WEDGE AND STRIKE ONE MORE TIME!" Shouted Zhang He again.
...
...
Wang Kuang looked at the troops at the wall with worry. He had launched the siege as Zhang Yang ordered him to.
The siege was not going well as Wang Kuang had guessed as the number of ladders was too few. His soldiers could not secure a foothold on the wall at all. Thus, he resorted an attrition tactic by using the archers to shoot arrows to the top of the wall, hoping to decrease the number of the defenders.
After Zhang Yang left, only twelve 5, 000-man-battalions were remaining. Because of the sudden siege order, he had sent three of the twelve platoons to the wall with ladders and a battering-ram. They were exchanging arrows and climbing the ladders now, and the number of his troops was decreasing quickly.
'One-fifth of the men is probably gone, but the enemies should have suffered some damages too. '
Wang Kuang looked at the battering-ram which had managed to station in front of the gate. It was a matter of time that the bronze gate would be pummeled and broken by the continuous wooden-log ramming.
'The ram is in position. There is nothing the enemy can do now. '
*BWOOOH*
Wang Kuang heard the sound of a horn from behind. He looked back and saw the white dust made by the horses from a distance.
"Damn it! What's that idiot is doing? Why are the enemies here!?"
The Henei Governor could not comprehend why the enemies could appear behind his army after Zhang Yang and his men had gone out to pursue them. He even took Wang Kuang's cavalry units and left him with only infantries.
Wang Kuang could see the commotion within the rear troops. The enemies had crashed with all five of his battalions.
"Feng Yue! Take two battalions and assist the rear troops!"
Feng Yue, a general of Wang Kuang Army, bowed and left with his lieutenants. Feng Yue managed to ride his horse toward a platoon of formation before he felt an earthquake.
From the top of the west cliff, a massive army of horsemen with odd outfits rushed down the mountain.
"Another ambush! Get ready! Spear-*BANG*"
A gunshot sound interrupted Feng Yue's words. The general's eyes turned blank and collapsed from his horse, revealing a hand, which extended out from a small oval void, with a strange black object with white smoke out of the muzzle. It had pointed behind Feng Yue's back of his head a moment ago.
The hand retracted back into the black space and disappeared into nothingness, stunning the onlookers to the point that they had forgotten about the rushing horsemen.
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