Let's turn the clock back to the morning of July 1. According to Tasman's recollection, the time he officially saw the Jiannu Brigade was 11:26.

At that moment, Tasman, sitting on horseback, craned his neck. Without using a telescope, he clearly saw fluttering flags emerging from the banks of the Suzi River. It was dozens of red-trimmed flags, held by knights in armor.

"That's the red flag of Jiannu." Deng Jianshan, who was on the side, said to him, "These people holding banners should be Baijia, which is a special warrior in the Tatar army." ”

Tasman nodded slightly, not taking his eyes off the Tatars who were kilometers away. Since he came to the East a few years ago to do business, he has never felt the atmosphere of war again. Now that he saw the enemy, he seemed to be back on the battlefield where he had fought the Spaniards, and his face was a little red from the surging blood.

The cavalry of the Dongjiang Army spotted the enemy earlier than the Tasman. Twenty minutes earlier, the Rangers had dispersed into small groups to take on Kennu's forward cavalry.

Horses galloped across the flat land by the river, the neighing of military horses, the shouts of knights, the sound of shooting, the sound of archery, and the noisy sound mingled, and the smoke of gunpowder slowly rose between the two armies. From time to time, knights fell from their horses, and a few were lucky, dragging their wounds in their direction; And most of the knights who fell off their horses would be hacked to death by the enemy cavalry in the melee.

Beside Tasman, Mao Wenlong, who was on a horse, was also watching the ranger duel. The war horses equipped by the Dongjiang Army are all military horses of the breed bred on Jeju Island, and their shoulder height and weight are more than one grade better than the Mongolian horses of Jiannu. Although the Jianzhou Jurchens are known to be skilled in archers and horses, they are after all a fishing and hunting people who grow in the white mountains and black waters, and they are not much better than the Dongjiang cavalry in terms of equestrianism. It was the Dongjiang cavalry that had the upper hand in the dog fight, and the Houjin cavalry had been suppressed on the battlefield close to the Red Flag Brigade.

As the herald waved Mao Wenlong's handsome flag, more knights rode into the battle. During this expedition, the Dongjiang Army was equipped with two battalions of cavalry, totaling more than 800 people. These knights are all veterans selected from the Dongjiang Army Headquarters, most of them have served in the Ming army, and their equestrian skills are much better than the wall cavalry, and they can undertake the tasks of dog fighting and charging at the same time. Now, the cavalry left only two companies of escort infantry, and the rest were all scattered and pressed towards the Jiannu infantry in a semicircle, which was used to cover the battlefield and create a fog of war against Jiannu.

The battle battlefield selected by Mao Chengzuo's staff was north of the Suzi River, about ten kilometers southeast of Maerdun Village. It didn't have a name, it was just a plain by the river. After this battle, Mao Wenlong personally named it: Blood Stream.

The Blood Flow Creek is a bend in the Suzi River. Here, the meandering Suzi River carves out a pocket to the south. The width of the river ranges from 80 to 100 meters, which is undoubtedly a glancing barrier for non-swimmers.

In fact, Major Mao Chengzuo had a plan when he designed the battle plan, preparing to annihilate the Red Flag Dudu Department in this pocket. Surrounded by water on three sides, the Blood Stream was naturally a good place to fight a war of annihilation, and Mao Chengzuo believed that the Dongjiang Army had the ability to destroy his opponents.

At about 12 o'clock, the two armies gradually approached a distance of two kilometers. Dudu was very surprised that the Dongjiang army appeared here, they did not expect that the Dongjiang army would abandon Hetuala—they never believed that Hetuara had been conquered so quickly—and the army would seek to fight with the main force of the Houjin.

The cavalry of the Dudu Department had less than 300 cavalry. Although there are many horses, they are basically not suitable for battle, and can only be ridden or transported during the march to save physical strength. After the Dongjiang Army completely covered the battlefield, the Houjin army fell into passivity. As a last resort, Du Du drove a large number of Han troops under Wuzhen Chaoha to fight. These Han soldiers all had family members under the surveillance of Houjin, so they did not dare to defect on the spot.

The characteristics of Du Du's department are that there are many infantry and few cavalry, and there are many Han troops and few slaves. There are only two or three hundred Zhenyi, and Du Du still has to leave them in the rear to supervise the battle. Standing at the front of the team were more than 1,800 Wuzhen Chaoha, and Baoyi Aha in his early 1,000s.

Lieutenant Colonel Shang Kejin, who was in charge of presiding over the battle, sighed slightly. He could naturally see that the main force of Jiannu was Han Chinese. But he couldn't ask his men to show mercy because of this. If his subordinates were restrained by his orders, resulting in one or two more casualties, he would likely be brought to the Iron Mountain court-martial.

"Pass the order," Shang Kejin turned around and glanced at Mao Wenlong, who nodded lightly at him. So he turned around and said to the herald, "Go ahead!" ”

Soon, Shang Kejin's order was conveyed to the three regiments with the flag. The three regiments in front of him spread out in a north-south direction, with two Korean vassal corps to the south and the Donggang Corps to the north. The Korean regiment was arranged in battalion units, arranged in a triangle from west to east, with two battalions facing the Houjin army at the bottom, and the battalion near the headquarters of the Dongjiang Army serving as the reserve of the two battalions on the west; The Dongjiang Army, on the other hand, pointed the sharp corners of the triangle at Houjin.

The Houjin army probably didn't expect the cavalry of the Dongjiang Army to be so powerful. Since Mao Wenlong founded Dongjiang Town, Houjin has never seen a cavalry unit of the Dongjiang Army. At this time, the Houjin troops, like the Ming army in the past, were like a quagmire surrounded by cavalry.

After the Dongjiang Army set up a formation, the Houjin side showed a position of local defense. As a result, more than a hundred previously captured captives were dragged to the front of the army - these prisoners were so badly wounded that they could no longer be pulled back to Kuandian.

In front of thousands of Jiannu and Baoyi, the military judges of the Dongjiang Army raised their broadswords. As the snow-white blades gleamed in the sunlight, the screams of the captives before they died echoed through the silent battlefield. Blood poured out of the broken neck, adding the first touch of blood to the stream of blood.

The Houjin army array boiled. Du Du could not tolerate such a provocation, and the psychological superiority he had established over the Dongjiang Army for a long time, as well as the mental impact on his subordinates, prompted him to take action.

As the trumpets sounded in the Houjin army, three thousand Jiannu began to advance eastward. Loud footsteps sounded on the riverside, and the infantry of both sides walked towards each other at the same time.

At this moment, the spirit of Tasman has been fully committed to the battlefield. In a trance, he almost felt that he was on the front line of the Thirty Years' War, surrounded by disturbing city militias.

The North Korean soldiers walking in the queue did not have the Tasman imagination. Under the command of the company commander, they marched towards the Houjin army at a speed of 90 paces per minute. The drummer standing on the left side of the company beats the drum one by one, adjusting the speed of the queue by the sound of the drum. The melodious sound of the flute sounded, easing the mood of the nervous infantry.

And on the far right of the battle line, the Dongjiang Army Guards Regiment advanced 120 paces per minute. There, Shang Kejin concentrated 80% of his artillery, as well as all the cavalry except the rangers.

Five minutes later, the entire front was clearly curved: the northernmost Dongjiang Army was more than seventy meters above the Korean vassals, and a short gap appeared between them.

According to the post-war review, Du Du must have noticed this. Maybe he could guess the Dongjiang Army's intentions, or maybe he couldn't. But it didn't matter, he was never able to respond to it. The poor command system and extremely low morale make flexible troop movements a luxury. Any commander with the most basic military experience knows that prompting a response in such a situation can easily cause the entire front to be exposed.

As a result, the Wuzhen Chaoha of the Later Jin Dynasty were still approaching in a straight line—this kind of straight line was a relatively straight line, in fact, their phalanx was really rough—and the only thing that could play a little role was that Du Du put the sharp soldiers who supervised the battle to the north of the team, facing the direction of the Dongjiang Army.

The battle line approached in an eerie calm. When the two sides reached a kilometer point, the chasseurs cruising in front of the battle line began to move. They were in small groups and fired freely in the open space in front of the two armies.

Scattered gunshots rang out one after another, and little by little firelight flashed on the north bank of the Suzi River, and the white smoke was quickly blown away by the cool breeze.

The dense infantry formation gave the smoothbore gun a high hit rate. Since the battlefield had been controlled by the Dongjiang Army rangers, the hunters boldly pressed to a hundred meters in front of the Houjin army. At this distance, even a blind man can deliver lead bullets to the enemy - of course, it is common to aim at A and hit B, and aim at C and hit D.

Dozens of Zhenyi archers emerged from the dense Wuzhen Chaoha army. Armed with their bows, they walked in front of their own queue and competed with the Dongjiang chasseurs. They soon discovered that the gunners of the Dongjiang Army did not care about themselves at all. Each of the hunters was throwing fire at the Uzhen Chaoha behind him, and none of them turned their guns on them.

After the bow and arrow flew at a distance of sixty or seventy meters, it was not said that it could hit the target, and even if it hit all of them, the vast majority of them would not be able to penetrate the chestnut of the hunter. And the lead bullet that flew over 100 meters, against the cotton armor of Wuzhen Chaoha, could still kill a person with one shot.

Such a contest is unfair. The Houjin army, which was advancing in formation, suffered a one-sided blow, and everyone did not know if they would be killed in the next second. Archers who shoot hard in front of them do not work in any way other than psychological effects, and this psychological effect does not seem to have much effect.

The Wuzhen Chaoha subconsciously quickened their pace, and the formation became more and more loose. Under the threat of the hunters, they will inevitably increase their movement speed to reduce the amount of time they are exposed to gunfire.

As a result, only ten minutes were left in the battle.