The sky was overcast, and the wind blowing from the prairie was cold and dry.

Behind him, a large group of staff officers were busy marking on the map, and at the foot of the mountain, countless musketeers lined up in a long column, marching through the mountain road.

The weather was bad, and the battle was not good.

After the main force of the Jungger East Route Army approached Jing County, Zhao Liangdong immediately recalled the cavalry troops on the outside line of guerrillas, and at the same time repaired the defense of Jing County, preparing for the large-scale attack of the Eight Thorns, but unexpectedly, I don't know whether it was because of the lack of troops or lack of confidence, the Mongolian army launched several feints and then did not make a big move, the strong fortress of the Han army may be prohibitive, and after the confrontation between the two armies for half a decade, the Mongolian army suddenly divided its troops to the east, bypassing the Han army's Jingxian camp, and constantly sent small troops to harass the Han army's grain road, While ambushing and looting the military supplies delivered from Datong, he attacked some cottages that had surrendered to the Han army, and destroyed the beacon towers and post stations that maintained the passage.

The Fifth Army quickly responded, the brigade of men and horses continued to attack from Jing County, the Han army to the battalion level as a unit, in the militia and the new annex of Xiangyong, Toucheng with the cooperation, try to prevent the destruction and harassment of the Mongolian army, the two sides in the Wuniu Mountain area of the outbreak of small-scale fierce battles, because of the relationship of mountain warfare, the Mongolian iron cavalry in this small-scale conflict can not take any advantage, although the Mongolian horses are petite and dexterous, but the rugged mountain road of Wuniu Mountain is obviously more suitable for infantry movement, The nomads' usual ferocity seems to have hit an iron wall, and the Han soldiers are not inferior in terms of their will to fight or their ferocity.

According to the analysis of Chief of Staff Cui Weiya, the tactical intention of the Mongolian army should be: in the case of being unable to overcome the strong city defense of the Han army, use its own cavalry superiority, send a small force to harass the rear of the Han army, isolate the main force of the Han army that moves slowly, and weaken the attacking Qing troops, and wait until the Han army trapped in Jing County is weakened, and then concentrate troops to eliminate the main force of the Fifth Army in one fell swoop, so as to achieve the strategic goal of consolidating Shanxi and rejecting the Han army outside Jin.

This analysis was agreed by Zhao Liangdong, in fact, the traditional tactics of the Mongolian army have always been like this, not surprising at all, whether it is the record in the history books, or the oral experience of the Han army, it is clearly pointed out that the advantage of the Mongolian army is the strong mobility and the cavalry and archery ability of the soldiers, if it is to fight with them in the plain area, the Han army with infantry as the main force is obviously very difficult, so when the eight thorns gathered the main force and pressed Jing County, Zhao Liangdong was very rational to shrink the troops and put oneThe "hedgehog" formation gave up the initiative on the battlefield to attack, causing the Mongolian army to unscrupulously divide its troops and attack flanks in the case of a large army.

This is something that cannot be helped, although the Mongolian army is approaching the main force of the Han army, but Zhao Liangdong understands that if he leads the army to attack, the Mongolian army will never fight a decisive battle with the recuperated Han army in the field, and retreat step by step while maintaining contact, using the advantage of cavalry, calmly and calmly going around in circles with the Han army, until the Han soldiers can't walk, and then turn around and eat the fifth army in one bite.

This is the classic tactics of the Mongolian army since the time of Genghis Khan, and it is also their magic weapon, although Zhao Liangdong is very familiar with this tactic, but in the current situation, there is no good way to crack it, the current Mongolian army has more than 14,000 troops, while the Han army has only 12,000 soldiers, plus the 9,000 militia and only 20,000 militia with the transport of baggage, and in this large-scale decisive battle, the surrendered army and the local squire's strong men and village warriors can not play a role at all, Forcing them to participate in the battle would definitely be counterproductive, and in this lack of cavalry units and the lack of superiority in manpower, the Han army simply did not dare to leave the fortified fortress and engage in a decisive battle in the field with the army of Dzungar.

However, this does not mean that the Han army can watch the Mongolian army cut off its own grain routes, in fact, since the original rapid attack plan failed, Zhao Liangdong put the main energy on the maintenance of the grain route, some time ago when the cavalry brigade and the Mongolian army were entangled, Zhao Liangdong sent a large number of militia, with the cooperation of the local townspeople, along the mountain road from Datong to Jing County built countless pillboxes and beacon towers, and at the same time issued a "clear field order", ordering all the mountain people in the area of Wuniu Mountain, Orions and individual farmers in the cultivated mountains all moved into the cottages, and then forced the leaders of each cottage to sign the "Hu Driving Notice", and together with the Han army, they "guarded against bandits and Hu", and regularly sent villagers to patrol along the road, and took on the early warning of the Fifth Army's grain road and the defense of the stronghold.

In this situation, the war entered another state of tug-of-war, at first when the Mongolian army entered Wuniu Mountain, it was not very much to look down on these local villagers, and the commander of the Zhunger East Road Army sent an ultimatum to all the cottages in accordance with Mongolian practice, ordering the leaders of the Wuniu Mountain Cottage to surrender to the village within three days, otherwise the chickens and dogs would not be left after the village was broken.

The local cottages in the gap between the army were terrified, they did not dare to offend the Han army, nor did they dare to be enemies with the Mongolian army, as a last resort, most of the cottages secretly sent the Mongolian army a "reward" of pigs and sheep wine, lost money and surrendered, and ignored the Mongolian army's open surrender request, only close to the mountainous area, under the direct threat of the Mongolian army, a few cottages surrendered to the Junggar army.

This ambiguity apparently annoyed the Eight Thorns, and on the fourth day after the ultimatum, the Mongol army launched an attack on some of the cottages that refused to surrender, and after a day and night, the Eight Thorns conquered five large and small cottages at the cost of hundreds of casualties, and then led the army to slaughter the entire village.

The tug-of-war immediately entered the white-hot stage, after receiving the news, the Han army immediately reacted, the Fifth Army in addition to sending a small number of troops to support the resistance of the cottage, Zhao Liangdong mobilized a group of elite troops, carrying small artillery to attack the "traitor cottage", under the artillery offensive, the musket troops very easily conquered these hostile cottages, and then regardless of men, women and children, all the people of the "traitor cottage" were killed, its ferocity and viciousness, exactly the same as the Mongolian army, by no means inferior to half a point.

Inevitably, the small units of both sides fought fiercely in all corners of the Wuniu Mountains, because the terrain was steep and rugged, and neither side could put in the larger formation of troops, this kind of battle broke out at the company and platoon levels, and the battle process was short and intense, often once the two armies came into contact, they immediately shot at each other with muskets and bows and arrows, and then charged, and the two sides fought in a melee on the mountain stream path, and after each suffered heavy casualties, they tacitly stopped fighting, monitored each other's disengagement, and returned to their own army stations.

Compared with large-scale field battles, this kind of small team form of combat is more brutal, often after a battle, both sides will lose more than average troops, and there is little chance of escape, collapse, soldiers have to do their best to fight to the death in order to survive.

This mode of battle has dealt a heavy blow to the morale of the Mongol army, compared to the Central Plains army in Baode, Daizhou and other places that they swept before, the tenacity and bravery of the brainwashed Han army are really daunting, from the beginning of the war, until now the tug-of-war of small troops, except for a few seriously injured and unconscious people, the Mongol army has never found a Han soldier who surrendered voluntarily, the Han soldiers have been fighting in a state of religious fanaticism, and the troops of Junggar are only fighting for robbery, This state of mind apparently had a major impact on the morale of both sides, so much so that after Saeed's Hui troops entered Wuniu Mountain, a small surrender** occurred.

However, this small-scale surrender was quickly curbed, but this was not because the generals of Junggar were in charge of the army, but because the Han soldiers refused to take in the prisoners, and the brainwashing campaign showed its negative impact here, although the middle and high-level officers repeatedly demanded that the troops "treat the prisoners well", but the lower-level officers and soldiers simply ignored this set, and the views of the army that talked about "ambition to eat Hulu meat, laughing and thirsting for Hun blood" and other views occupied the absolute upper hand. The combat troops invented countless extremely cruel torture to deal with the Mongol captives, and once the Mongol soldiers were captured, if the situation permitted, they would usually be sent to the nearest cottage, and then the cottage leaders would be forced by the Han army to carry out "chopping" (that is, cutting the muscles one by one with a knife), and then behead the captives after they died of pain, and the air-dried heads were soaked in lime and hung on the walled walls to show that they were not at odds with the Mongol army, and in the case of committing "blood debts", These cottages had to stand firmly on the side of the Han army and fight against the Junggar army.

However, more often than not, the Han army could not calmly execute the prisoners, the Wuniu Mountains were remote and few, and the physical consumption of the soldiers in the mountain warfare was extremely huge, and it was obviously impractical to escort the prisoners over the mountains and mountains every time, so except for a few strong obedients, the soldiers usually put ropes under the captives' ribs, then tied their ankles, tightly tied to two strong mule horses, and then drove the livestock, and pulled the captives' bodies into bloody pieces of flesh - this popular punishment was named "tearing" The effect is similar to the traditional "waist chop", but because of the technical aspects of the operation, the captives are usually much more painful, the human spine is very tough, many times the muscles are often stripped of the bones but not torn off, the torso will be pulled into a bloody bone frame, the captives cry and howl in extreme pain situations, often half an hour to die of blood.

Hatred continued to be superimposed in the cruel war, the murderous methods of the Han army soon caused the retaliation of the Mongolian army, the torture of both sides soon spread from the warring soldiers to the common people in the war zone, the battle became more and more intense, under the strong request of the front-line soldiers, the Junggar East Route Army had to add troops again and again, into the battle for the grain road in Wuniu Mountain, until now, more than 14,000 Mongolian troops, in addition to the three thousand iron cavalry on the periphery of Jing County, stationed and monitored, They all threw themselves into this irrepressible war of retaliation and counter-retaliation.

As the scale of the battle expanded, Zhao Liangdong had to personally lead the army to fight in many cases. Just two days ago, an important fortress on the periphery of the two armies was broken by the Junggar army, and more than 2,000 people in the village were killed by the Mongol army. This cottage is located in the middle of the grain road of Jingxian and Datong, the terrain is precipitous, after the front card, you can directly overlook this traffic lifeline related to the life and death of the Han army, and according to the reconnaissance of the scout rangers, the main general of the Zhun Geer East Route Army seems to have moved the camp of Zamur Hara Thorn here, this time Zhao Liangdong after more than ten days of careful preparations, mobilized the main force of the Fifth Army, determined to recapture this vital stronghold in one fell swoop.