Chapter 281: The First Appearance of the Musket

The shadow of the Battle of Taizhuang has always hung over the hearts of Meng Yuan, and they did not fail to learn a lesson, on the contrary, they have repeatedly studied the great war that shattered their dreams and even lost their leaders and almost lost their leaders, and even sent a large number of detailed works to collect news about the Battle of Taizhuang in the newspapers of the Song Kingdom.

In that war, most casualties still occurred during the rout, and the actual number of casualties from artillery, mines, and poisonous smoke was not even comparable to the number of casualties in hand-to-hand combat. This proves that the deterrent power of firearms is far greater than its actual lethality, and that Genghis Khan would not have been defeated if it had not been for the damned place in Taizhuang.

Therefore, when they learned that Li Ye, who was deeply hated by them, led a force of less than 10,000 people but with 3,000 mules and horses and 600 carts, both Polu and Yan Shi were thrilled.

Polu has Polu's plans, and he has a strict mind. In addition to avenging Temujin and reviving Meng Yuan's prestige, Polu also wanted to take advantage of this victory to plunder more supplies for Meng Yuan, so as not to be subject to the logistics of the Jin State as he is now. Yan Shi wanted to earn some credit with this battle, but he was defeated, and for a Han general like him, there would not be much loss - this time they brought more of the cowardly Xue and Tanma Red Army.

On December 2, the third year of Yanhuang, in the suburbs of Yuanzhou (now Pei County), less than 100 miles away from Xuzhou, Li Ye finally got the news he wanted.

"Menghu actually poured out of the nest, and he really looked up to me." He laughed.

It was more than 80,000 Menghu cavalry led by Polu himself, of which nearly 10,000 were cowardly, and more than 30,000 were Tanma's red army, and 40,000 were newly attached to the army, which was the main force of Mengyuan who followed Polu southward.

When these 80,000 cavalry appeared on the horizon, it was like the tide in the Qiantang River in mid-August, first a distant line, and then a large area that swept the sky.

Polu looked at the Song army from afar and did not rush to attack, because he found that the Song people were not unprepared, on the contrary, in the face of his army, the Song people put on a strange formation.

In order to facilitate drainage, the concrete pavement is slightly higher than the surroundings, the Song people take the concrete road as the central axis, and the vast majority of the big cars are spread out in the vertical direction of the road, forming a pair of wings, protecting the two wings of the Song people, in the middle of these two wings, every thirty steps or so, there are three big cars in the shape of "product" swing open. The Song people did not completely hide in the chariot formation, on the contrary, most of the Song troops were in the middle of the "zigzag" chariot formation, as if preparing to meet the attack. On each side of the road, about 1,000 Song people lined up in six columns, armed with iron tools like burning sticks. In addition, on each "zigzag" convoy, there were about 12 Song soldiers, who were watching from a high position under the cover of the carriage.

The equipment of the Song people is very strange, one-third hold that kind of short stick, two-thirds hold a long halberd, a large shield, a waist knife and a small round shield, and the Song people outside the car formation take every one hundred and eighty or ninety people as a small array, and the distance between the small formations is less than ten steps, depending on the situation, you can retreat into the car formation behind you at any time.

"There is no danger to defend, and there are no mines to rely on, these Song people are bold on the ground!" Polu was not Temujin, and he was far less confident in his military command than Temujin, and he saw that the Song people's chariot formation had only just been set out and had not yet been fully formed, and he felt that this did not seem to be a trap.

"Leader, do you think Menghu will be scared? If you scare us away with an empty city plan, then we will lose a lot. Shi Da Spoon can be regarded as a long-term battle, and he is not nervous in this situation, and he said beside Li Ye.

"Probably not, at least tentatively." Li Ye said with a smile.

Sure enough, a moment later, the sound of bull horns in the Menghu formation rose desolately, and one team of Menghu from the left and the other from the right began to detour behind the Song army. It's just that the Song army's chariot formation is arranged in two wings, whether it is in front or behind, there is always half of the cart and the Song army facing Menghu. After surrounding the Song army, Polu ordered a troop of 10,000 men to attack.

This team of 10,000 people is a strict Han army, he snorted in his heart, somewhat dissatisfied.

The 10,000-strong team formed a formation 300 steps away from the Song people's car formation, and then began to rush forward, and when they rushed into 150 steps, Li Ye ordered: "Open the cannon!" ”

On the cart left on the road, more than a dozen artillery pieces began to roar. These more than ten guns are different from the old artillery of Qinglong Fort, they are all field guns that are easy to maneuver, although the gun body is light and the firing range is small, but the power of the explosion is still very large, they are named "Crouching Tiger" by Ao Sayang. In the face of a series of bombardments by the "Crouching Tiger", the Han army did not collapse, and in the past few years, Menghu has not been idle, how to maintain the queue and morale under the artillery attack of the Song army, which is also the content of Menghu's exercises.

"Stupid, it's so dense under the bombardment of platoon artillery." Li Ye muttered and cursed.

Although it was a Han army, they all had horses, and with only two rounds of Crouching Tiger's attack, they broke into a distance of less than a hundred paces from the Song army. The first column of the Song army unhurriedly got down on one knee and raised the "Wu Mu Zero Three" to aim, and behind them, the second column of the Song Army also raised the "Wu Mu Zero Three", and the third column of the Song Army was also ready to launch.

"Both!" The most junior officers began to look at Li Ye's banner and give orders.

The Mengyuan army began to draw their bows, and it was not as easy as people imagined to shoot on horseback, and the short bow used by Menghu could not be compared with the heavy crossbows of the Song people. Only a few of the most outstanding warriors in Menghu could have drawn their bows on horseback, and there were no such figures in these attached Han armies.

Guo Xian is a member of the Han army, he has always been brave, and he always boasts of courage, so he refuses to be left behind. He drew the bow with one hand and the other to the brim, and when he got closer, he shot at the opponent he had already chosen.

"Fire!" He heard more than a dozen people in the Song army shouting in unison.

He was confused, and then he heard the sound of "bang" in a row, and as soon as he saw the faint smoke coming from the Song people's fire-like weapon, he felt as if something had hit his chest hard, and the whole person flew out upside down and fell to the ground.

crashed down from the galloping galloping horse, and Guo Xian's body was almost shattered just by falling. What made him even more painful than this fall was that he had no idea how the Song people used to shoot him down.

As a rear-loading flintlock pistol, the Wumu 03 skips the stage of arquebus and breech guns, and directly enters the rear-loading card-shell flange primer. Moreover, with the strength of the ordnance factory, it is not a problem to outline rifling. The lookout hill on the gun makes it possible for the soldier to use it not by feeling but by alignment. The primer of the bullet used thundermercury, which is obtained by reacting with mercury from the river to make nitric acid, which is then reacted with mercury from the Wa Kingdom to make mercury nitrate, and then reacted with alcohol. Although the thundermercury primer still has such and such shortcomings, this era is already the best primer, installed at the bottom of the paper shell bullet with fixed gunpowder, as long as it is well preserved, pay attention to not damp, skilled soldiers can shoot five shots in a minute, and the three-stage shooting method makes it possible to maintain a very lethal barrage in front of the troops even in the face of the rapid charge of the cavalry.

Unfortunately, the strict Han army became the first victim of Wumu 03's actual battle, and their charge collapsed when they were still thirty paces away from the Song army. The lead pellets shot from the Wumu Zero-3 musket rushed towards them with a roar, even heavy armor could not protect their vital points at such a distance, not to mention that most people only wore leather armor in order to be light!

The attack of a team of 10,000 people collapsed in an instant. Guo Xi fell to the ground, and finally got up, only to find that his companions had spread out to both sides, bypassing this strange formation of the Song people, and he was the only one standing on the entire battlefield.

The rest of them stood on the horses that had lost their master, snorting uneasily or looking sadly at their unmoving master, who had a close relationship with their master, and would stretch out their warm tongues to lick their master's bleeding face.

Guo Xian cursed, pulled out his waist knife and continued to rush towards the Song army, but only rushed a few steps, and among the group of Song troops facing him, a row raised the short stick at the same time, and then, he heard a clean voice sound: "The third gang of the fourth association, aim and shoot!" ”

Guo Xian watched as those people aimed at him with short sticks, he roared again, and then he heard the sound of a battle, and a faint green smoke and inconspicuous fire came out of the hole of the opponent's short stick.

It was the last thing he saw, and after the aimed shot, at least three lead shots entered his body, one hitting his head and two piercing his chest. His body, which had been rushing forward, trembled violently as if it had been stopped by some invisible force, and then fell to the ground.

Blood was pouring from his wounds and the corners of his mouth, but he had lost all consciousness.

After two years of musket training, each person had to shoot at least 20 rounds of ammunition a day, and the shooting skills that had been practiced after two years of shooting more than 1,000 rounds of ammunition in the past two years. They had battlefield experience, they would not be easily shaken in the face of the onslaught of the Monhu cavalry, and their arduous and rigorous training made every step of the musket firmly recorded in their muscles, allowing them to react instinctively in battle.

This is a unit that far surpasses this era in terms of morale, military discipline, equipment, and quality, and it is also a unit that spends far more than any other branch of the army in this era.

"What's that!"

Polu grabbed his hat in panic and screamed in desperation.

If although the artillery is amazingly powerful, its bulkiness determines that it still has an Achilles heel in the field at this time, then the fire-like weapon used by the Song people now makes Polu keenly feel that the last short board of the Song people's field battle has also been lengthened.

He also had a hint of luck, in his mind, this new weapon caught by the Song people in his hands may just be a new crossbow machine, with the help of gunpowder, as long as it can continue to impact, then its inconvenient reloading weakness will be exposed. Polu believed that the distance was the world of the Song army, and the close distance was the place where the elite warriors of the Mengyuan Dynasty showed their martial prowess. He gritted his teeth and gave up the idea of fleeing, and instead ordered the whole formation to be regrouped.

"Taishi, the situation is not good, it seems that the Song army has already premeditated." Yan Shi saw the sound of explosions in the opponent's formation, and then his own soldiers fell off their horses in pieces, and even some of the war horses fell directly, as if they were pierced by a crossbow. But there was no trace of the arrow, which made him feel a kind of fear.

"Demon law, demon law......" He thought so in his heart, but he didn't dare to say it to Polu, but said in a low voice: "Taishi, a strong attack is not a way, it is better to withdraw first!" ”

Polu glanced at him, shook his head and said: "No, no, if you don't dare to decide the outcome of this battle, when this army enters Xuzhou, how can you attack Xuzhou?" ”

He still hasn't said half of it, this is their surprise attack, not the Song army's preset battlefield, if under such circumstances can not be defeated in battle, even a small setback will be defeated, then from now on, Meng Yuan will inevitably fear the Great Song Dynasty like a tiger. Moreover, such a cowardly act, after being transmitted back to the country, is bound to make those who are conquered despised. The battle of Taizhuang was already a heavy setback for Mongolia, if it were not for the vitality of the cowardly Xue army, the conquered tribes would have fallen apart long ago, and if they fled without a fight this time, then the myth of the invincibility of the Mongolian cavalry in the field would have been broken.

"If that's the case, I'm afraid that both my Great Yuan and the rest of the khanates will immediately fall into civil strife......" Polu stared at the Song army array, and secretly thought in his heart: "Yan Shi is a smart person, how can he not see this, if my Great Yuan falls apart, he has 100,000 people, whether it is to join the Song State or to stand on his own, he has the capital to rely on......"

In an instant, Polu thought about many situations, he took a deep breath, and couldn't help but be slightly annoyed, he knew that the Song army had this new weapon, and he should not attack so hastily no matter what, and it was only right to wait until the night to sneak attack.

Thinking of the night sneak attack, Polu's heart moved again, and he looked at the Song army, only to feel that although the Song army had many mules and horses, they were all mules and horses that pulled a large army, and it was not suitable to run.

"Taishi, the team has been reorganized, but you want to order another attack?" While he was thinking about it, one of the members came over and asked for orders.

"No, let's get out of the way." Polu immediately made a decision and ordered again.

Yan Shi was taken aback, just now he was still against evacuation, why did he change his mind again in the blink of an eye?

Polu's choice to retreat surprised Li Ye greatly, and with his understanding of Menghu, he thought that since he had a superior force of tens of thousands, Menghu should choose to attack, just like Temujin's choice in Taizhuang. But he forgot that after the Battle of Taizhuang, although Menghu did not break his courage, he no longer dared to underestimate the combat effectiveness of the Song army. If you hadn't seen the power of the musket, you might have reluctantly taken the risk, but since you have tasted the pain of the first attack, how can you continue to die!

"Good!" Shi Dascoo was originally standing beside Li Ye with a musket, and he was overjoyed when he saw this situation: "Menghu is just like this!" ”

There was a cheer among the Song army, and against this cheer, Menghu began to withdraw from the west, and Li Ye watched them disappear like the wind, and his brows couldn't help but lock in one place.

Is Menghu's withdrawal true or false?

"Participate, do you want to chase?" Song Siyi was also a little excited, when the battle of Taizhuang was the beginning, they spent a lot of effort, and they injured countless robes, so they won a big battle, and today, they just put three rows of guns, consumed thousands of bullets, and tens of thousands of Menghu troops turned around and fled, leaving more than 500 corpses in front of the two armies, and the guards were unscathed!

"Chasing people on two legs and four legs, what is in your head?" Li Ye glared at him: "Let's think about it for me, whether this Menghu is really retiring or fake!" ”

"Menghu's vitality is not injured, it is just a small setback, and it is naturally not a rout." Hearing him say this, Shi Dasco became serious: "But our army has no gaps, and Meng Hu will naturally choose to withdraw when he sees that he can't please him." ”

"Exactly." Song Siyi didn't say much, but only agreed with two words.

Li Ye shook his head, his brows were still tightly locked, he felt that things were not so simple. Menghu had only regrouped his troops, clearly preparing to attack again, and then the whole army retreated, and although the retreat was swift, it was extremely methodical, proving that the commander of Menghu did not lose his mind out of fear.

Then they withdrew their troops, there must be some conspiracy.

Note 1: Baidu says that Italy had spiral rifled guns in 1476 at the latest, and that the Danish army was the first to be equipped with rifles at the beginning of the seventeenth century.