After two days of marching, Hou Dagui's army marched along the Sanggan River in Xuanfu and arrived at the eastern city of Shunshengchuan. At that time, it was raining lightly, and the army was stationed in the city, preparing to go directly to Xuanfu Town early the next morning, and Hao Mingluan took his five hundred cavalry to Xuanfu Town overnight to convey news.

Hou Dagui has been thinking about Sun Chuanting for several days, but for some reason he is always restless and almost sleepless at night. So that night, I chose a secluded courtyard in the city, lay on a soft bed, and wanted to cultivate my mind and mind. Unexpectedly, there were sudden showers at night, wind and rain, and thunder, disturbing people's dreams. Hou Dagui was covered with a quilt, and finally felt a little sleepy, at this time, the old wooden window was blown open by the strong wind, and then closed again, and the sound woke him up instantly.

"Chief, General Hao is back."

Hou Dagui was sitting at the table listening to the wind and rain raging outside the house, but he heard the soldiers on duty knocking on the door.

"Why did he just come back?" Hou Dagui was stunned. It stands to reason that Hao Mingluan, who set off in the evening, should not even arrive at Xuanfu Town at this time.

Still wondering, the door of the house was suddenly pushed open, and a gust of cold wind poured into the house, causing Hou Dagui goosebumps. When he looked up, he saw a man wearing a hat in front of him, and the rain dripped to the ground in streams along all corners of his body.

"Manager Hou, 100,000 urgent!" It was Hao Mingluan who spoke.

"What's wrong? Did you turn back halfway? ”

"I just arrived in Huai'anwei, and I learned that Sun Chuanting had been surrounded by Tartars!" Hao Mingluan took two steps forward, his clothes shook and the raindrops fell to the ground, and his face was full of anxiety.

"What? Tell me about it! Hou Dagui's heart chuckled.

"Can't be wrong, Sun Chuanting's army is surrounded in Chaigou Fort at this time."

"Who's around?"

"I heard from the banner soldiers who escaped from Chaigou Fort that this morning, Sun Chuanting's army marched to the left guard of Wanquan, and suddenly Tartars attacked from the east. Sun Chuanting was caught off guard, lost consecutive battles, and retreated westward into Chaigou Fort. The Tartars blocked the roads on all sides, besieged fiercely, and it was also raining heavily that the troops were temporarily stopped. ”

Hou Dagui was cold all over his body, and said, "Tartar from the east? His grandmother's, it seems that inviting us to Xuanfu is Tang Tong's bureau. "The town of Xuanfu is east of Wanquan Zuowei, and without Tang Tong's cooperation, the Qing army cannot attack Sun Chuanting's army unscrupulously.

"Tang Tong, this grandson ......" Hao Mingluan gritted his teeth, "Turning his back on the Ming and throwing himself into the Tartar, he is a Han in vain!" ”

Hou Dagui asked: "If this Tartar of Xuanfu is retreated from Guangling County, there are five thousand people in the sky, even if you add Tang Tong's seven or eight thousand people, it will only be more than ten thousand people." Sun Chuanting has 20,000 people, how can he be trapped? ”

"I don't know, but at the moment it can be concluded that the situation in Chaigou Fort is unfavorable, and we must rescue it quickly." Hao Mingluan said.

Hou Dagui clenched his right hand and put it on the table, frowned and muttered for a while, and said: "In this way, you take someone to Chaigou Fort first, inform Sun Chuanting, and say that the reinforcements will arrive soon, so that he can defend the city with peace of mind." I'll pick up my troops and horses here, and then I'll be there. As for Datong, I will send people tonight to urge them to march. ”

The most important thing to defend the city is a breath of heart, Hao Mingluan has few elites, and all of them are heavily armored horse troops, it is not difficult to break through the encirclement, and tell Sun Chuanting the news of the arrival of reinforcements in advance, which can somewhat calm his heart and boost morale. However, the current situation of the Qing army is still a fog, and Hou Dagui has been fighting for so many years, and there is still vigilance that he should have. Even if Sun Chuanting is trapped, he will not cover his head desperately, and he is bound to advance slowly. If five thousand are enough, move quickly; If the 5,000 people are not enough, they will wait for the soldiers and horses of Datong Mansion to arrive.

This is the safest way at the moment, Hao Mingluan listened, did not hesitate, nodded and said, "Okay, I'll go first!" Then he turned around and fled into the rainy night.

Zhang Xianbi walked in from outside the house and said, "Chief, do you want to call the brothers up now?" ”

Hou Dagui looked outside, shook his head and said: "Don't worry, the rain is heavy in the night, which is not conducive to marching and fighting, and we will act when we are tomorrow." He added, "You immediately arrange for people to go to Datong to move troops, there is no battalion to stay, and the other 5,000 horse troops must come." ”

Zhang Xianbi hesitated: "Then Jiang Xuan...... I'm afraid that this old boy will play tricks. ”

Hou Dagui heard this, pondered for a long time, and said: "That's it, call the Wuqi camp together." ”

Zhang Xianbi said: "The manager arranged it like this......"

Hou Dagui exhaled deeply and said: "In the worst situation, Tang Tong and Jiang Jiu have turned back, and our army has become a lone army in the middle. The more lonely the army, the less it is possible to disperse the forces. Gather up our army, preserve the strength, and no matter how bad it is, Guangling County can hold on. ”

Zhang Xianbi's heart was pounding, and he frowned and said, "Do you have to save Sun Chuanting?" ”

"With Sun Chuanting here, at least he can contain the enemy army in Xuanfu. Sitting back and watching Sun Chuanting fall, our army's situation will be even worse than it is now. ”

When Zhang Xianbi heard this, he sighed speechlessly, paused slightly, and walked quickly.

The cold wind was still blowing, and Hou Dagui sat there unconsciously with his body tense. Slowly unfold your right fist and find that your palm is covered with sweat.

The next day, it rained heavily. Hou Dagui set off with his whole army. The road was muddy, the march was half a day, and the number of displaced people who were close to Huai'an and Wei, and the number of displaced people who helped the old and the young along the road suddenly increased.

Hou Dagui made a little discussion in Huai'anwei and collected information at the same time. Sure enough, Tang Tong had already taken refuge in the Qing State, and the road east of Xuanfu was currently tightly controlled by Tang Tong's soldiers and horses.

Huai'anwei's commanding envoy surnamed Li, was the hereditary official of Huai'anwei, and also served as the garrison of Chaigou Fort, but he happened not to be there when the Qing army besieged Chaigou Fort and escaped a catastrophe. According to his statement, Tang Tong had sent people to circulate a few days ago to inform them to prepare to meet the Ming Wangshi, but it was really strange that he suddenly defected somehow. Tang Tongbing was the strongest in Xuanfu, but his people were outsiders and were unpopular. Commander Li's heart is towards the Ming Dynasty, which originally hindered Tang Tong's strength, and he still cooperated with him in both political and military affairs, but now that Tang Tong has rebelled against the Ming Dynasty and returned to the Qing Dynasty, Commander Li is not resentful, and even prepares to take his family to Datong Mansion for refuge in the past two days.

Hou Dagui also learned from Commander Li that an army had recently come from the direction of Beizhili and Shandong, and the number was quite large, and it joined up with the Qing soldiers and Tang Tong's soldiers who had retreated from Guangling County, and the number was no less than 20,000. Previously, Hou Dagui had heard that the Qing army was divided into two ways to clean up Shanxi and Shandong, so it seems that the sudden increase in the strength of the Qing army in Xuanfu is likely to be the Qing army that was originally in Shandong and came to Shanxi.

"The main general of the Tartars in Shanxi is called Ye Chen, who is a veteran of the captives, famous for attacking the city, and the siege of Chaigou Fort was planned by him. I don't know much about the Tartars from Shandong, but they are the ones who are guarding south of Chaigou Fort at the moment. Commander Li did his best to tell Hou Dagui what he knew about the military situation.

In the past, when the Jurchens hunted collectively, each person sent an arrow, and one of the ten people was selected to be the commander-in-chief, and the remaining nine people obeyed the orders of the commander-in-chief to follow all directions, and were not allowed to be confused. Nurhachi reformed the Niulu system and integrated the military and the government, which could not only become a production establishment, but also conduct military operations in wartime.

Generally speaking, there are 300 men per cow, a few of them are standing soldiers in armor, and most of the rest are reserve soldiers, and even in the event of a major war, they will not mobilize all their troops, and basically draw 30% or 60% of them, so that they can keep the surplus to continue to engage in production and other conscription. Later, Nurhachi's army gradually grew, and every five oxen were recorded as a Jiala Ezhen, which originally meant "the knot in the middle of the branches of plants, trees, bamboos, etc.", which meant that the nail La's forehead was really connected to the upper and lower levels. Above the Jiala forehead, there is a solid mountain forehead. Every five Jiala Ezhen set up a solid mountain Ezhen, "Gushan" in the Jurchen language is the meaning of "flag", Gushan Ezhen in Chinese, is the flag owner. There are also two Maile Ezhen beside Gushan Ezhen, "Maile" means "both sides", describing the deputies standing on both sides of the flag owner, which is quite vivid.

The military system from Niu Lu Ezhen to Gushan Ezhen is the foundation of the Eight Banners of the Qing Dynasty. Generally speaking, there are about 25 cattle in each banner, with a total of about 7,500 people. However, with the passage of time, the scale of the Eight Banners continued to expand, and later the Eight Banners of Mongolia and Han were added, and the strength of the troops was no longer comparable to that of the past.

Ye Chen is inlaid with red flags and solid mountains. The current banner owner is Luo Luohun, the eldest grandson of Prince Li, and there are some small banner owners, Ye Chen is one of them. Compared with other banner owners such as Luo Luohun, Nikan, and Shuosai, Ye Chen has the oldest qualifications and the most military achievements, and is a veritable first general with red flags.

"South of Chaigou Fort?"

"Exactly, Chaigou Fort is a mountain in the north and south, and only the castle is above Pingchuan."

Hou Dagui nodded and said: "The Tartars are guarding the mountain in order to prevent our army from rushing to the south to aid Chaigou Fort. Then he asked, "How many Tartars are there guarding the mountain?" ”

Commander Li thought for a while and said: "The two Tartars are not very many, most of them have gone to besiege Chaigou Fort, and the number of people guarding the mountain is estimated to be one or two thousand. ”

"More than a thousand Tartars ......" Hou Dagui thought lively, "there are not many people, the Tartars are good at the horse army, and now they are guarding the mountain, which is to promote their shortcomings and give up their strengths, and my five thousand people are all infantry, even if the heavy rain does not open firearms, it is still okay to attack the mountain more and fight less." ”

Commander Li looked at Hou Dagui's eyes and asked, "The chief manager wants to fight the tartars?" ”

Hou Dagui raised his arms and said, "Fight." ”

Commander Li was overjoyed and said: "The chief manager pacified Shanxi, just took the Tartar in one go, and returned the peace of my Xuanfu." Then he said, "The chief manager wants to send troops, and the villain is willing to lead the way!" ”

Hou Dagui had the intention of testing the combat strength of the Qing army, and immediately ordered the dispatch of troops. After lunch, the army rested a little, and then went straight to the mountains south of Chaigou Fort.

The Qing army guarding there was exactly 1,000 men, subordinate to Ye Chen's subordinate Aliha Chaoha, and commanded by a Jialazhangjing. Aliha Chao Han dialect is "cavalry", which is to set up a camp horse army with Gushan Ezhen, which is quite elite. Ye Chen's deployment of the horse army in the mountains was not a fool's move, but rather a blind spotlight on the combat effectiveness of these soldiers.

Most of the Jurchen tribes built walled cities in steep mountainous terrain, so from the time of Nurhachi's unification of the Jurchens, most of them fought in the mountains. For example, in the twelfth year of Wanli, when Nurhachi attacked Zhaojia City in the Hunhe Department, he led his troops to brave the heavy snow, cut the mountain for the rock, and forced the Kaha Mountains. In the same year, he braved the rain of arrows and rolling stones, and stormed the steep Mardun Cottage. In the following year, he defeated the allied forces of the four cities of Jiefang, Salhu, Dongjia, and Barda at Tailuangang, and the two sides also fought fiercely on the ridge. The list goes on and on.

Since the Nurhachi period, the Qing Dynasty has been able to flourish because of its strong infantry. Although there were not many horse troops in the early Nurhachi army, because of the dense mountains and forests in the Baishan and Heishui areas, the horse army usually needed to dismount and fight on foot, so the duty of the war horse was mainly to carry and maneuver. At first, Nurhachi possessed very little armor, arms, hands, and stuns, and was easily tired of heavy armor in rugged mountain battles, so his infantry was mostly lightly armoured and held short bows, and climbed like flying, and was extremely fast. In the 21st year of Wanli, in the Battle of Gule Mountain, which was the decisive battle of the Haixi Jurchens, Nurhachi resolutely ordered all his subordinates to remove their heavy armor, all of them went into battle lightly, and dismounted and walked slowly during the battle, and finally achieved a great victory. In the forty-first year of Wanli, Nurhachi fought against the Ula tribe, the strongest of the Haixi Jurchens. At this time, Nurhachi's army already had a full-time "short-armored soldier" for light armor combat, and relied on infantry combat to shoot, inflicting heavy losses on the opponent.

Therefore, the tradition of the Eight Banners is long in foot combat, and together with the horse army, they are also good at foot combat.

When Hou Dagui's army arrived, looking up at the not steep mountains, under the rain, the armor of the Qing soldiers was as bright as ice and snow.