The army and a group of people set off towards Houtu Fort, passing by yesterday's battlefield, still full of wreckage, a fishy smell came to the nose, many wild dogs and are wandering back and forth here, gnawing on the corpses on the ground from time to time, seeing someone passing by, vigilantly raised the dog's head full of blood, the slightly green dog eyes are chilling. The dry trees above the battlefield were full of crows, and after a certain leader called, they flapped their wings and flew into the air to form a black whirlpool, and then swooped in the direction of the corpse, like a scene of the end of the world.

By the time the army reached Houtu Fort, it was already dawn. Liu Ce found out that something was wrong at the beginning, originally there should be more than 6,000 people in the entire banner regiment battalion, but now there are one-third less, and in addition to the deputy chief flag Zongsheng personal guards and a few camp pipe bands, the headquarters of the general flag Zhu Song and several staff generals are not there. After sorting out his thoughts, Liu Ce felt that something was wrong, but he didn't have to think much about it before he was assigned to his defensive area.

Houtu Fort, built in 76 years of the Great Zhou calendar, was originally established by the fort people Tuntian, when it was first built, the fertile land here was about 600,000 mu, and rice could be harvested 4 times a year (the growth cycle of grain in the other world was short), which was enough to supply Gaoyang City ten miles away for a year. However, later the rule of officials was corrupted, the scholars and wealthy merchants colluded to forcibly seize and take private land, and the local villagers went bankrupt and looked for other ways, and from the 176th year of the Great Zhou Dynasty, the land that could be paid for grain in Houtubao was less than 100,000 mu, and it was decreasing year by year. By the year 202 of the Great Zhou calendar, Gaoyang City needed to purchase millions of stone (150 catties per stone) of grain and grass from other places every year to maintain the needs of hundreds of thousands of people in the city for a year. It lasted until the year 232 of the Great Zhou calendar, and all the Houtu Fort had been converted into private land, and the original fort residents either found another way out, or gave those scholars and gate lords as tenants to eat...... In 288 years of the Great Zhou calendar, due to the monopoly of the Shi clan gate lords, coupled with the decay of the government, a large-scale peasant rebellion broke out in Heyuan Province, but it was brutally suppressed by Zhao Zhenyuan, the governor of Heyuan at that time, it is said that all the 60,000 peasant prisoners who participated in the rebellion were executed by Zhao Zhenyuan on the side of the Hunhe River, and the blood stained the entire Hunhe River, which did not fade for several weeks, and Houtu Fort bore the brunt of that uprising, hundreds of thousands of acres of fields were trampled, and more than 200 fort people were brutally tortured and killed by the red-eyed bankruptcy mob, and the heads were stacked into a hill.

In 322 years of the Great Zhou calendar, Heyuan Province once again suffered a large-scale peasant rebellion, when Zhao Zhenyuan's son, Zhao Yingshan was the governor, his methods were more brutal than his father Zhao Zhenyuan, and it is said that all the peasants caught were cut into human beings and fed to dogs. And in that riot, Houtu Fort was trampled by the mob again, hundreds of thousands of acres of land were destroyed, dozens of people were killed, and the gentry suffered huge losses.

After the death of Zhao Yingshan, his eldest son, who is now Zhao Yuanji, succeeded to the position of governor, but unfortunately the good times did not last long, and in the fifth year of his succession, that is, in 353, the largest uprising of the exiles in the history of the Great Zhou Dynasty broke out. There were bankrupt citizens, merchants, peasants, and people who came here to survive, as well as soldiers and generals who were dissatisfied with the status quo in the army, and a large-scale team of displaced people swept the entire northern and central part of Heyuan, and Zhao Yuan was extremely unable to face the erosive situation, so he asked the central Zhou for help. The Great Zhou royal family attached great importance to it and sent one of the central ace troops, the Thunder Army, to settle the chaos in Heyuan Province, but more than ten years have passed, the situation is more erosive than before, the Great Zhou army and the rebel army have been in such a stalemate for more than ten years, the difference is that the thieves are fighting more and more, and Houtu Fort has long been desolate under the sack of the central army of the Great Zhou local army and the thieves several times, and there is no prosperity in the early years of the Great Zhou Fort.

Houtu Fort is the only way to Gaoyang City, if you take a detour, it will take another 6-7 days, so the thieves will definitely capture Houtu Fort first when they come this time. Although the number of thieves is large, Liu Ce knows that their food is extremely scarce, and even the phenomenon of cannibalism has occurred, so it is impossible to make a detour, Zongsheng sent troops to guard here, he agrees very much in his heart, can sit in the important position of the Thunder Army, be named a general, and the person who holds the flag is absolutely impossible if he only relies on the reputation of the scholar clan.

Liu Ce came to the place he listed to defend, and a half-mile-long earthen wall only on his chest came into view, this earthen wall was less than a meter thick, and the potholes were irregular, as long as it was a person, he could easily climb over this earthen wall, and if the opposite side had excellent physical fitness, he could even climb over it with one hand.

Liu Ce frowned, his location was where the thieves needed to break through the first line of defense, but with such a rudimentary fortification, if a team of archers on the opposite side entered within a hundred meters, they would definitely be shot into hedgehogs, didn't this call him to death. Fortunately, Liu Ce has fought with thieves in the past, and the number of archers on the opposite side is extremely rare, and even if there are, the arrows are scattered, and they are not an effective threat to themselves, Liu Ce is very grateful that the original owner of this body can practice martial arts to this extent, so that he can walk down alive on the battlefield several times.

Liu Ce was divided into the third column of spearmen, with 1,000 spearmen in five columns and 125 sword and shield men on each side, a total of 1,250 people guarding the first line of defense. The earthen wall behind the second line of defense behind him was also 1,250 soldiers of the same formation, but their earthen wall was one level higher than their own, and the height of the earthen wall did not change from their own. Liu Ce was speechless about this arrangement, although the archers in his flag regiment were scarce, if he gathered these hundreds of archers and placed them behind the second section of the earthen wall to shoot a few waves at the charging thieves, then the frontal pressure of his team would be much smaller, and it could also have a deterrent effect on the thieves, instead of scattering the archers and putting cold arrows around to fight separately.

The third line of defense is 1,500 people, and it is still dominated by spearmen and sword and shield hands, but there are more soldiers who use heavy weapons, such as dozens of pounds of long-handled giant axes of madmen, as well as many chain hammers, maces and other weapons.

Then there are Zongsheng's 150 personal guards, speechlessly, this army wearing iron armor, with high-quality fine iron forged weapons, almost everyone has horses and horses The army will always hide at the back of the battle line, and when the war is smooth, it will be dispatched to chase and kill to obtain meritorious service, and when the war is critical, it is always the first to leave everyone behind with the commander and leave. What's even more ironic is that these well-equipped guards are composed of men and horses with outstanding military achievements in various camps, but from the moment they joined the guards, they quickly decayed, and their courage and combat ability deteriorated rapidly.

Woo woo woo~

The horn made of animal bones sounded, Liu Ce held the spear in his hand tightly, and when he raised his eyes, a corner of the sky appeared one by one scurrying black dots.

"It's finally here!" Liu Ce suppressed his anxious emotions, staring at more and more black spots on the horizon, which gradually turned into thick lines............