Although there were only sentries of each team and a few officers on duty in the open space on the edge of the slope, Sun Zhongshan still finished the count unhurriedly.

“…… Twenty-nine. Thirty. One by one, my lord, the number is finished! Sun Zhongshan paid the order. ”

Shang Cheng nodded approvingly. He took two steps towards the edge of the slope and found a position opposite his vision, moving condescendingly. The lights had been extinguished in the camp, and the tents at the foot of the big meadow and the soldiers assembled on standby were all hidden in the darkness. In the distance, the cavalry of the Tuqi people had changed from a column to a horizontal formation, and the torch team with six or seven layers of layers stretched out for three or four miles from north to south, and approached the Zhao army camp like waves. Seeing the enemy getting closer and closer, the camp was still dark and deadly silent.

Sun Zhongshan followed Shang Cheng's side, staring at the slowly moving torch lines on the field without blinking, as if a war drum had been put into his chest, banging, his hands and feet were spasming uncontrollably, and he gritted his teeth to death before he could barely grasp the waist knife. He is not afraid of death and war, but he has not experienced such a big battle scene since he joined the army, it is inevitable that he is a little nervous and excited, and there is some uncontrollable excitement - he is a criminal prisoner who is sent to the border, and being a sentry chief is an exceptional promotion, without the merit of field beheading, it is impossible to be promoted again, and if he wants to return to his hometown in fine clothes, he can only make up his mind on the enemy......

While he was thinking wildly, he heard a long chirping of painted horns, and the enemy's horse team gradually stopped, neither concentrating nor charging, and set up a long formation less than five miles away from the army on the left, and quietly confronted the Zhao army. A few trumpets fluttered in the wind from the camp under the meadow, and then fell silent.

Sun Zhongshan instigated the corners of his mouth and peeked for a long time, but he still couldn't see a clue, he squinted his eyes and glanced at the two border soldiers who followed Shang Cheng one by one, Su Zha lowered his eyelids, and seemed to be indifferent to everything in front of him, Tian Xiaowu hung his hands, grasped the head and tail of the leather whip and dragged it back and forth tightly, looking eager to try. Peeked at Shang Chengyi's young boss who stood still like a stone Buddha statue, his facial features were hidden in the dark, and he couldn't see his face clearly......

Sun Zhongshan asked in a low voice, "My lord, why hasn't the enemy come up yet?" He was immediately startled by his hoarse voice.

“…… What did you say? ”

Sun Zhongshan swallowed his saliva and calmed down for a moment before he asked again: "My lord, why hasn't the enemy come up yet?" Didn't the ancient books say that once you go all out, you will be exhausted by three times? ”

Shang Cheng turned his face to look at him, and then his eyes swept over the two border soldiers, seeing that they were all looking at him with doubts on their faces, knowing that these two guys didn't understand what Sun Zhongshan said, "One, two, three", so he smiled lightly and said: "They occupy the Alegu grain depot, isn't it just 'one go'?" Wouldn't marching forty miles at night to repel the reinforcements sent to the grain depot by the battalion be counted as 'declining and exhausted'? Now, if they dare to come up, I'm afraid that even rabbits will bite them to death. ”

Tian Xiaowu and Su Zha were still thinking about it, and Sun Zhongshan had already understood what Shang Cheng said. But just because he understood this truth, he felt that the situation of the confrontation between the two armies in front of him was quite strange. While contemplating the mystery of the joints, he weighed the words and asked, "...... Since the Turks were exhausted from afar, why didn't the army take the opportunity to fight? ”

Shang Cheng groaned and did not answer the question immediately. In fact, he himself was puzzled. The more than 3,000 enemies in front of them were obviously the same group of men and horses as the enemy who attacked the Algu grain depot, even if they did not participate in the battle to attack the grain depot, they also intercepted the cavalry sent by the large battalion to reinforce the grain depot on the way. At this time, as long as two or three battalions are sent out of the village to stop the waist and rush, these enemies will have to get out! But why hasn't the Left Route Army sent people to attack and harass it so far? Is it because they did not see clearly the enemy's reality and did not dare to act rashly, or was the command of the rear battalion afraid of cowardice? Or are you bound by a military order to guard against it? Of course, it is more likely that the rear battalion will report the enemy's movements to the top, and let Commander Li make the final decision.

He sighed regretfully. Alas, what a pity! What a good opportunity to destroy the enemy, it was wasted like this! Especially when the morale of the army is fluctuating, if you can win a beautiful battle, how important it is to boost morale! And it can also disrupt the enemy's deployment! Can ...... now

But he also knew that even if the rear battalion first asked the large battalion for instructions, such a practice would be beyond reproach. It's just that the commander of the rear battalion doesn't know that now that the people of the rear camp are surrounded on three sides, and all kinds of military information are concentrated in the big tent of the Chinese army like snowflakes, how much time will it take to wait for Commander Li to understand the situation in the rear camp and make a judgment before issuing a military order? At that time, the enemy should have a little respite, and his heels have initially stood firm, and then sending troops out to fight will only be half the effort.

He was silent for a while, seeing that there was still no movement in the camp, he knew that the Zhao army had completely lost the fighter, and there would be no new progress after looking at it, and he was about to go back to rest, when he heard the horns behind the meadow in the distance chanting war drums like thunder, and the shouting and killing roar that shook the mountains broke through the quiet night sky in an instant, and then there was a burst of shouts and fighting sounds like wind and rain and lightning from the left and right sides of the camp.

The Turks have done it?!

So fast?!

Shang Cheng's eyebrows jumped suddenly, he turned around and strode to a higher place, looking towards the west with a thunderous sound of killing. The camp of the baggage camp is located in the deep meadow of the back camp, and the left and right sights are blocked by the terrain, so that the small camp in the north direction cannot be seen at all, and the small village in the south can only be seen halfway. Although he could only see a corner of Nanzhai, he could see a few clues from the meteor rockets and the sky-pounding firelight that rained back and forth in the camp, one by one, the enemy was storming Nanzhai! Even though here and Nanzhai are separated by a distance of six or seven miles from each other, the fiery sound of killing can still be heard clearly, and the sound of horses neighing and weapons handing over and colliding can be faintly heard in the wind; In the meantime, there was also a dull thick string accent from Zhao Jun's unique bed crossbow when it was fired, and it buzzed and buzzed...... Then turn your face to look north, the watchtower standing at the highest place of the meadow is still dimmed and the fire is extinguished, and the red light of the high-pass red fire ignited in the direction of Beizhai for half a day, the outline of the black and dark becomes extremely clear, just like a reckless monster entrenched in a high place, watching his home being destroyed but indifferent......

The more he looked at it, the more he was shocked, the more he looked at it, the more angry he became, and the last confusion and confusion turned into soaring anger!

Suffer your mother!

Shang Cheng spat on the ground fiercely! What kind of bird thing is this engaged in by the Left Route Army! The grain depot was attacked, and the enemy had set fire to the warehouse, obviously because of the disparity in strength between the enemy and us, the defenders of the grain depot could not resist, but the army only sent a thousand cavalry to help, was this a fucking reconnaissance or reinforcements? The enemy on the three routes is a tired division that has come from afar, and the left army does not take advantage of the enemy's unstable foothold to wait for an opportunity to annihilate the enemy, nor does it send troops to attack and delay the enemy's assembly and rectification. Li Wei has been dealing with the Turks for so many years, and he still doesn't know that the favorite method of the Turks is to fight weaknesses and establish prestige, even if Li Woo wants to hold on to the village and wait for reinforcements, why didn't he order the whole army to concentrate at the beginning of the warning? Even if he wanted the three camps to be horns and watch each other, why didn't he send more troops to both wings?

Anger, pain, sadness and despair, these feelings overwhelmed him in an instant. His heart was as heavy as a flood. His face was distorted terribly, and his joints were blue-gray because his hands were clenched too tightly, and you didn't say anything about Li Wei's greed, adventurous advances and retreats, and the enemy was at a loss, but why did you trap the left army to death? !

This is a full 40,000 people, one by one, hand in hand, lined up, can be lined up from the Alegu River all the way to Yanshan, and it is gone? You know, these people aren't all soldiers; Half of them were men and horses who had been recruited to carry heavy grain and grass......

Forty thousand! I don't know how many of them will be able to set foot on the land of Dazhao again, and how many will stay on this grassland forever......

Forty thousand......

His dying ** frightened Sun Zhongshan and them, and no one dared to come over and ask him what was wrong, their eyes widened, watching him staggering away.

Without the support of the battalion, the two small villages in the north and south could not hold out for long, and they were kicked flat by the Turks that night. In the early morning of the next day, Qian Laosan, whose eyes were red, woke him up, and a herald handed him an official letter from the Department of Military Affairs of the Great Army: because the grain route had been cut off by the Turks, it was impossible for the grain teams to return as scheduled; At the same time, because of the tight war in the army, the grain guards of each grain team, regardless of the border army or the guards, were unified into a battalion, which was commanded by the rear battalion and attached to the baggage battalion, which was responsible for guarding the safety of the baggage battalion; And he is the battalion captain of this team. The appointment is effective immediately.

Shang Cheng smiled bitterly and took his letter of appointment. He could never have imagined that he would return to the Guards under such circumstances. You know, he has been thinking about it for almost a year if he wants to be a battalion captain in the guards, but he can't hear the slightest reply when he asks someone to talk about human favors, and he can't see the slightest hope. In fact, he was now almost giving up on the idea and preparing to stay in the border army. But fate played a joke on him at this time, just overnight, he actually returned to the guard and became the battalion captain who should have been him. Moreover, this is still the establishment of the main battalion, and the soldiers he can command now are almost a thousand, and in terms of numbers alone, this may be the largest battalion of the Yanshan armies; But in terms of combat effectiveness, most of the battalions he led were the worst battalions in the whole Yanshan, and his composition was too complicated, there were both border troops and guards, there were recruits who had been in the army for less than a year, and veterans in their fifties, and they came from 17 or 8 military villages, and they were neither familiar with nor trusting each other, but he simply did not have time to pinch these people into a whole. He couldn't even recognize all the officers under him! For example, the official document said that the deputy assigned to him was Zhu Daichun, the deputy of the C Battalion of the Guangliang Border Army, and he had heard of this person last night, but the light was blind, and he wrote down his name, and he didn't know who Zhu Daichun was, nor did he know what kind of temperament his deputy was......

But at the moment, he can't care about expressing any feelings. Crushing the fluttering and heavy letter of appointment, he felt the weight of the burden on his shoulders. Now he not only has to worry about the more than 100 soldiers who have followed him from West Malaysia, but also has to worry about the soldiers in the other more than ten food teams, but the problem is that he is completely blind to the situation of these soldiers, even if he wants to worry, he may not be able to worry about the idea for a while!

He spent the whole morning talking to his new subordinates. Some of the officers and soldiers who had been newly transferred to his command admired him very much, and they did not speak in a diutical way, and as long as he wanted to know, they almost did not shy away from telling him bluntly. But some people don't like him, although they don't dare to confront him face to face, but they also talk about his problems. In addition to getting to know his subordinates, he also took the time to run to the baggage camp, and asked his acquaintance Hao Zhushu to make it convenient for him to do it one by one, his people needed a large number of guard standard equipment, from iron armor, leather armor, military boots, knives and guns to tents, quilts, water bladders, dry food, everything in the baggage camp, he wanted. He even asked for a few iron pots and shovels and iron picks for digging improvised fire pits, although he hadn't even figured out what these things could be used for, but since other guard battalions had been distributed, he had to serve according to other people's standards.

Then there is the staffing and staffing of the posts. He thought that since the official document did not specifically indicate the appointment of a first-class officer, he could have discussed it with Deputy Lieutenant Zhu Daichun and then come up with a "cut first and then play", and then go back to the Military Department for the record. As a result, many of the eighteen grain teams were promoted to captain and sentry commander in an instant. Moreover, he promoted the officers and tried to avoid the old men of the West Malaysia Zhibian Army. His practice of avoiding suspicion immediately won the favor and praise of the vast majority of people, especially those who were promoted, and felt that he followed such a boss with a selfless boss one by one, even if he went up the knife mountain and went down to the sea of fire, his heart was also steady!

The only "selfish" thing he did was to merge the two small grain teams directly into the two outposts of West Malaysia, so that the two outposts were basically full. The officers and soldiers of these two small grain teams did not complain about him either. Everyone knows that the two posts of Ximazhi are the starting capital of the blind business, and entering these two posts shows that the Shang people treat them differently, and this glory alone makes others envious.

It was almost evening when he had done this, and he had time to pay close attention to the progress of the battle. It had been a busy day, and although he knew that the Tu Tsz had been harassing around the village outside the camp, he didn't seem to have heard much bad news. The enemy probably wanted to let the left army collapse on its own, so he did not attack with all his might. However, he knew that this must be an illusion, and that the enemy was actually taking the opportunity to rest and recuperate, and then try to crush the Left Army in one fell swoop. After defeating the left route army and losing the flank cover, the middle route army had only one way to retreat, and the retreat of the middle route army indicated that the northern expedition of 70,000 troops dispatched by the imperial court in the 19th year of the Eastern Yuan Dynasty was completely defeated......

The only thing he hoped for now was that the Left Army would hold out here for ten days, leaving plenty of time for the other two armies to retreat. He thought that the matter had come to this point, and that it was acceptable to exchange the lives of 40,000 people for the lives of 130,000 people. As for himself, he was mentally prepared to die here.

Just when he gathered a few old brothers from Ximazhi together to talk about it, in the direction of the front camp of the army behind the big meadow that had been fighting for a day, a burst of earth-shattering shouts suddenly erupted, and then it was as quiet as death for a moment, as if there was an invisible big hand waved at will, and all the sounds in heaven and earth disappeared without a trace. Several people looked at each other and were about to stand up to observe, when the hand waved again, and released all the voices—one by one, these people who were originally intersecting and unrelated shouted horses, and the weapons were mixed into a boiling noise, and finally condensed into a heart-rending howl:

One by one, the front door is lost!