Before arriving at Hongyan Lake, Zhao Junsheng had been sleeping on horseback until he arrived at Hongyan Lake.

There are many water birds such as wild geese on the shore of Hongyan Lake, most of them are wild geese, and now the weather is warmer, and a group of wild geese have returned from the south to lay eggs here to hatch and raise young birds.

There is no place to camp near the lake, and people who pass by here only fetch water from the lake. The men and horses of the baggage camp set up camp on the edge of the woods two miles away from the lake.

Gao Xu, Cao Jiao, Pei Jin and others sat around Zhao Junsheng and discussed the next arrangements together.

Zhao Junsheng asked: "Since the expedition, how has the training of the foot soldiers been in terms of riding skills and cavalry tactics?" ”

Gao Xu hugged his fists and replied: "The soldiers have made great progress, especially horsemanship, in this prairie is the best place to train horsemanship, the proficiency of various tactical tactics has also been greatly improved, and the improvement of riding and archery skills is the most obvious, mainly to follow the army to have enough arrows to practice, our baggage battalion is in charge of the transportation and storage of baggage, naturally there is no shortage of arrows!" ”

Zhao Junsheng asked: "Can the foot soldiers be converted into cavalry to participate in the war?" ”

Cao Jiao couldn't help but look at Gao Xu, Gao Xu groaned, hugged his fists and replied: "Dutong, I don't think it's okay, the brothers have made a lot of progress, but ······ The time is too short, it has only been more than two months since the expedition, the accumulation and precipitation are not enough, since now, the cavalry tactical tactics trained by the three thousand cavalry, although the infantry officers and soldiers have practiced, but they are not familiar enough, the cooperation is not close enough, the foundation has not been firmly laid, the tactical literacy has not yet been in place, and now the battlefield is to send food to the Rouran people! ”

Zhao Junsheng also asked, there was no expectation that the infantry who had only undergone two months of training would be used as cavalry, and he ordered: "Then continue to practice, and the foundation must be solid!" In addition, the infantry and baggage will retreat to Wolf's Head Mountain next, and you will set off when the cavalry brothers have finished supplying! ”

Gao Xu, Cao Jiao and Pei Jin clasped their fists together: "Obey!" ”

At this time, Gao Xiu hurriedly beat his horse and ran over to stop his horse and reported: "Dutong, things are not good, Pi Li first sent 3,000 cavalry to go straight to the camp by the river!" Due to the suddenness of the incident, Bai Jinguang had no time to organize troops to intercept it, and he was worried that Pi Lixian's brigade would be out of the sight of our army, so he could only send someone to report! ”

Zhao Junsheng stood up and changed his face suddenly, and immediately ordered Gao Xiu: "Quick, order the second and third thousand horsemen to assemble, and follow me to the riverside camp as soon as possible!" I hope that the guard posts on the periphery of the big camp on the riverside are not lazy, and I hope that the king of Yongchang and they can react in time to gather troops to meet the attack, otherwise, the consequences will be unimaginable! ”

"Yes!"

In less than a cup of tea, nearly 2,000 men and horses of the second and third thousand cavalry were assembled, Zhao Junsheng turned over and took the spear from Li Bao's hand and waved it forward: "Set off from the riverside camp!" ”

Gao Xu, Cao Jiao, Pei Jin and others clasped their fists and shouted: "Take care of your unified road!" ”

Zhao Junsheng waved his hand and led the army to run faster and faster.

After running for a while, Gao Xiu gradually approached Zhao Junsheng's side and said loudly: "Dutong, the distance from the place where Pi Lixian's army is located to the riverside camp is about the same as the distance from us to the riverside camp, and a long time has passed when we get the news, I am afraid that it will be too late to rush over at this time, if the King of Yongchang and they are completely defenseless, the Rouran people only need two moments to crush them!" ”

Where does Zhao Junsheng not know? He said, "Do your best to obey the destiny of heaven!" ”

He didn't know about this matter, but he knew that if he didn't go to the rescue, he wouldn't be able to explain it afterwards, and he still had to count on King Yongchang to help him block the persecution and pressure from all sides, so King Yongchang must not be fine.

Along the way, the two spare horses rotated and rode once, and finally arrived at the lakeside army at the time of Shen, but it was still too late.

The battle was over, the camp by the lake was in shambles, the corpses were strewn all over the field, the wounded who had not yet died were lying on the ground, groaning in pain, or howling miserably, and the scattered horses, cattle and sheep were eating weeds and flags on the riverside, and they fell to the ground and were trampled to the ground.

Many tents were burning in the camp, smoke billowing into the sky and emitting a foul stench, and many soldiers were cleaning up the corpses of their comrades and horses in the camp.

Zhao Junsheng and Gao Xiu stopped their horses, and the army behind them also stopped.

"Oh my God······ Now all the armies are afraid of heavy losses! Gao Xiu said with a solemn face.

Zhao Junsheng sighed and said, "The trouble of the Pondu is coming!" Gao Xiu, you return to our camp with the men and horses, and do not come into contact with other soldiers and horses, so as not to be infected with the epidemic! Li Bao, take the pro-army team with me to meet King Yongchang! ”

"Yes!" The two of them agreed with their fists clenched at the same time.

Zhao Junsheng and Li Bao stopped at the gate of the camp with their own troops, and slowly approached the camp on horseback, where corpses and stumps and broken arms were lying on the ground everywhere, swords, spears and arrows were everywhere, and the burning tent had not yet been extinguished.

Outside the tent, Zhao Junsheng had just jumped down, and the cavalry general Yanpu rushed up with a roar, "Zhao Junsheng, you bastard, Lao Tzu is going to kill you!" ”

A sharp war knife slashed towards Zhao Junsheng's head, Li Bao jumped in front of Zhao Junsheng with a double axe, and swung the axe to block Yanpu's war knife, staring at Yanpu with fierce eyes.

"You dare to stop General Ben? Give me death! Yan Pu was furious, and swung his knife at Li Bao again like a storm.

"Dangdangdang······" A series of weapons rang out.

Yongchang Wang Tuoba Jian came out of the tent and shouted when he saw this: "Stop! ”

With a "dang" sound, Li Bao blocked Yanpu's slash again and took a step back from his knife holder, but he was still in front of Zhao Junsheng.

Tuoba Jian looked at Li Bao with surprise, as far as he knew, the cavalry general Yanpu was also a fierce general, and the series of attacks just now could not be described as ferocious, and more than a dozen moves did not take down a pro-soldier captain, Zhao Junsheng's pro-soldier captain really had some ability.

Yanpu panted and said loudly to Tuoba Jian: "Zhao Junsheng was ordered to contain the army of Pi Li Xian, and now our army was attacked by the army of Pi Li Xian and suffered heavy losses, this matter is Zhao Junsheng's serious dereliction of duty, he cannot escape the blame, please ask the prince to be the master of the dead soldiers!" ”

The surrounding Xianbei generals bowed down and shouted: "Please make the decision for the brothers!" ”

"Get up, the generals of the various armies will go into the tent to discuss, and the others will disperse!" Tuoba Jian waved his hand and gave the order.

One of the kneeling generals shouted: "If the prince doesn't deal with Zhao Junsheng, I won't be able to wait!" ”

"Yes, if I don't deal with Zhao Junsheng, I won't be able to get up!" Someone immediately chimed in.

Seeing this, Tuoba Jian was furious: "What, what this king said doesn't work?" All of them should be given to this king to step down, otherwise they will be punished for disobeying military orders! ”

The soldiers remembered the strictness of military law, afraid of harming themselves, some of the soldiers who were just making trouble could not withstand the majesty of Tuoba Jian and retreated in fright, and the remaining soldiers saw that there was no support from others, and they did not dare to fight against Tuoba Jian, so they could only get up and leave angrily.

Tuoba Jian walked up to Yanpu with a tense face and stared at him, circled around him again, dropped a cold snort, and turned around and walked into the tooth tent.

Yuan He, Wan Dugui, Zhao Junsheng and several marshal's subordinate officers approached the tent in turn, Yanpu had been frightened into a cold sweat by Tuoba Jian at this time, raised his arm to wipe the sweat beads on his head, got up and followed the tent.

Tuoba Jian sat down on the main seat, several subordinate officers and generals of various armies stood on the left and right sides, he took a sip of water and looked at Zhao Junsheng and asked in a deep voice: "Zhao Dutong, tell me, why did the Rouran people suddenly kill?" Didn't your ministry try to contain them? When they sent troops to the battalion, why didn't you intercept them? ”

"Back to the prince, our army ······ last night" Zhao Junsheng gave a general account of the military action taken against the Rouran army last night, and finally said: "When the Rouran people sent soldiers and horses to attack the camp, the lowly and his men and horses were waiting for the Pi Lixian army in Hongyan Lake······ It's still a step too late! ”

"On the way to lead the army, I have been thinking in my heart, I hope that the guard posts outside the camp are not lazy, I hope that the prince and the generals have not relaxed their vigilance, but the fact is greatly beyond the expectations of the humble duty, you must know that the Rouran army that came to sneak attack only has 3,000 cavalry, but there are nearly 30,000 soldiers and horses in our camp, and it is still daylight, not nighttime, how can it be defeated by them in less than two moments?"

Xiaocai General Yanpu pointed at Zhao Junsheng and shouted: "The surname is Zhao, so you want to blame us?" We put all our hopes on you, counting on you to hold back the Rouran people, who knows that you are so useless, otherwise we wouldn't be so embarrassed, and we wouldn't have been killed by the Rouran people and suffered heavy losses! ”

Tuoba Jian raised his palms, and some of the other generals and officials held back when they wanted to speak, and Yanpu also closed his mouth.

Tuoba Jian asked: "Zhao Dutong, this king is very puzzled, why did Pi Li first know that our army was camping and send troops to attack here?" ”

Zhao Junsheng clenched his fists and replied: "Lord Wang, the people of Rouran are not fools, there are only a few locations within a radius of one hundred and ten miles that can be used as large campsites, as long as they use the elimination method, they can be sure that there are only two places that echo the request, that is, here and Hongyan Lake!" Hongyan Lake is on their way to tomorrow at the latest, and this is the only thing they are not sure of! ”

Tuoba Jian asked again, "Is it possible that your generals have been captured by the Rouran?" ”

Zhao Junsheng thought for a while and replied: "Lord Wang, the losses of our troops have been counted, and in addition to the corpses found, there are indeed more than a dozen missing, all of them are ordinary soldiers, but this does not mean that they have fallen into the hands of the Rouran people. Moreover, the subordinates of the lowly are all Han Chinese, although the Rouran language and the Xianbei language come from the same source, but there is also a big difference, under the first contact, the captured soldiers will not be able to understand, and the Rouran people cannot understand the Chinese dialect with dialects, in the case of not being able to communicate in language, how can the Rouran people know that our army camp is here! ”