As it was almost dawn, the intermittent autumn rain finally stopped. Prior to this, 500 new-style large-wing warships, 565 old-style warships, and more than 1,600 civilian warships had transported 190,000 soldiers and soldiers from outside Chengyang to the Huaishui coast of Xieyi overnight.

190,000 people were urgently transported, plus the original 30,000 defenders of Chengyang and Magu, nearly 40,000 county soldiers in Tang and Suier counties, and 14,000 soldiers temporarily levied in neighboring counties such as Xi County. The actual strength of the entire campaign reached more than 270,000 men, while the number of the Qin army was estimated to be between 100,000 and 200,000, which was the same Qin army that had attacked Chengyang a few months earlier.

There is an advantage in numbers, as well as in armor and tactics. During the four months from May to September, all the county soldiers in the country innovated their tactics, and all the halberd spears were eliminated, and the two-zhang and two-zhang four-foot spears became the standard configuration of the soldiers. The most important thing is the establishment, the original old establishment of one hundred men and one soldier has been changed to a new establishment of three hundred and twenty soldiers (including 225 spearmen, 50 riders, 36 archers, fifteen officer drummers, etc.), fifty riders may not be able to be equipped in a short time, or even never, but the archers do not have this problem, but the bow strength is weaker. Three stone archers are not enough, two and a half stones, two stone archers are also fine.

To put it simply, the range of a one-stone bow is equal to a two-stone crossbow, and a six-stone bow is relative to a twelve-stone crossbow. Both of them are the limit of a single soldier, the bow is more difficult, there are only a handful of people in the world who can open a six-stone bow, but more than 10,000 Wei Wushu can each shoot a twelve-stone crossbow. The pulling force of the Qin army's one-armed crossbow is generally three to four stones, which is equivalent to one and a half stones and two stone bows; The pull of a crossbow is about eight to ten stones, which is equal to a bow of four to five stones. The two-and-a-half-stone bow not only had the rate of fire, but also the range could suppress the Qin army's arm crossbowmen.

The spear array fought in dense formations, and what they were most afraid of was the bow and crossbow, and the armor and equipment of the Chu army were still incomplete at this time. At the time of the Battle of Chen Ying, there were about 60,000 sets of ring armor in the whole army (including 10,000 sets in the city), but unfortunately by the end of the war, about 8,000 sets were seriously damaged, mainly because the rivets fell off. From May to September, 48,000 sets of ring armor were produced in four months, but in exchange for grain, half of the production capacity began to be delivered to Qi in July. In other words, the Chu army was actually equipped with only more than 88,000 sets of ring armor, and with the repaired ones, there were more than 93,000 sets of ring armor that were really equipped on the front line.

The Chu army that attacked in Huaishui had 230,000 people, and more than 93,000 sets of ring armor, which was equivalent to four out of every ten people wearing armor. In a spear formation of fifteen people, the front six rows of spearmen were dressed in ring armor, and the back nine rows of spearmen were still wearing leather armor. This armor is still not high, and the plan of the Great Sima Mansion is that all the soldiers of the army are in armor.

Of course, whether or not superiority in weapons can be turned into victory depends on various factors such as tactics and command. At present, the Chu army is in dire need of qualified front-line officers, and the opening time of military academies has been delayed again and again, and the army can only adopt the method of training and training while fighting with the old and the new.

The only fortunate thing is that the battle of Jiyi was a battle of more and less. Of the 230,000 men, there were more than 850 soldiers and 53 divisions, and some divisions and brigades that were obviously unqualified and had no experience in spear formation operations were arranged at non-breakthrough points; and Chen Ying's division in the siege of the city, the division of the feudal monarch; The 50,000 elite soldiers and 30,000 royal soldiers in Chen Ying's field battle (at this time, each clan began to build its own private soldiers, so the divisions of the clans participating in this battle were abolished), and these 120,000 people were the real main force, arranged at the breakthrough.

At the dawn of the day, the Chu army began to bury the pot to make rice, and ate it at dawn. Although he was about to fight, he could only eat seventy percent full, and at the same time each soldier received two handfuls of grain, which was eaten during the war. It was sixty or seventy miles to cross the Huaishui to another section of the Huaishui, and there was no time to cook during the pursuit, so he could only eat glutinous grain.

As a veteran of Chen Ying's siege of the city, Chen Sheng's Wu was naturally arranged at the breakthrough. He carefully carried the grain sent by the logistics officer into his arms, but he was reluctant to pat off the fine foam on his hands, and only licked it carefully with his tongue.

Autumn in the mountains is sluggish, and the slight coolness makes people shiver, and the iron armor is even colder. Chen Sheng wore through the iron armor, this is an annoying thing, very heavy, it burns people to death when it is hot, freezes people to death when it is cold, and the coldest New Year's hand will fall off a piece of skin as soon as it is touched. But this is also a life-saving thing, the sound of arrows and halberds hitting the armor is terrifying at first, and it makes people happy when they hear more. What does it mean that a hundred soldiers don't hurt me, this is a hundred soldiers don't hurt me, which is much more useful than the talisman given by the old witch.

"Armor!" When Chen Sheng licked and licked the glutinous grain powder in his palm, the voice of the pawn commander came over clearly, then the voice of the long voice, then the voice of Chen Hong, the honorary scholar of Benlu, and finally the voice of the chief of the Wu Dynasty, Chen Chen's dog-tailed mink.

The order was given, and the whole army groped for armor in the darkness before dawn. After putting on the armor, it was dawn a moment, and the Huai water was flowing not far away, and on the shore was the continuous camp tent of the Qin army. There were so many huge armor Chu soldiers on the other side of the bank out of thin air overnight, and the Qin army on duty was taken aback. The drums soon sounded, and the sleepy-eyed Qin soldiers rushed out of the camp and lined up, taking a defensive posture on the bank to prevent the Chu army from crossing the river. At the same time, the military officer rode the queen and reported to the commander urgently.

It was Li Xin who led 30,000 guards and 4,000 cavalry to pursue Xiong Jing, and it was the veteran Zhao Shan who led the 150,000 Qin army to intercept the Chu army on the front line of Xie Yi to rescue Xiong Jing. Yesterday, Xiang Yan suddenly ordered the Xie Yi defenders to clear the Qin army's reconnaissance cavalry, and the reconnaissance cavalry did not return to the camp at night to make Zhao Shan uneasy.

Before the generals could discuss countermeasures, the enemy began an unexpected attack - more than 20 large ships turned their bows and dropped anchor across the Huai River. When the curtain on the boat was removed, what looked like a sail suddenly became a trebuchet. Such a change made Zhao Shan's heart completely cold, and when the first fire bomb fell, he was ordering all the commanders to defend the line and not let the Jing people cross the river.

There was no suspense in the landing operation under the cover of trebuchets, and the battle of Chen Yingdonghu for supplies had proved that it was necessary not to get close to the water surface of the chasm for 350 steps, otherwise you would die under the iron bullets and crossbows of the Jing people, and 350 steps was enough for the Chu army to land on the shore and line up. The Qin army, who did not know this, did not retreat urgently, but hoped to hold the riverbank, which cost them dearly.

The firebombs rained down, and the Qin army, lined up at the water's edge, quickly broke and fled. The trebuchet on the boat was immediately replaced with an iron bullet with a longer range, and the angle of fire remained the same. At this time, the Chu army began to land one after another, and when their army stepped on the west bank of the Huaishui, the first Huaishui defense line of the Qin army was lost.

Xiang Yan's battle order did not require the Chu army to attack the Qin army on the left and right in a roundabout way, he only ordered the Chu army to quickly occupy the second Huaishui defense line after landing on the shore, regardless of the rest, that is, to seize the wooden bridge on the Huaishui that had been burned by Xiongjing and repaired by the Qin army.

'Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa'......'. The Chu troops who rushed ashore did not even line up, and hurried westward. The sound of the armor was bursting, and the Qin soldiers who fled to both sides after the collapse were stunned, they felt that the Jing people must be crazy: so many heads did not come to cut here, but they ran to the back as if they were fleeing; Commander Zhao Shan's heart almost exploded, the Chu army did not just want to crush himself, but wanted to cut off his own back road, and encircled and annihilated the 150,000 Qin army between the two Huai Shui, he had to urgently call the gold and order the army to retreat.

One side beats the drum, and the other side sings gold. The two armies of Chu and Qin no longer fought, and only fought a race of life and death on the avenue about seventy miles between the two Huaishui. The Chu army Wang pawn seized the opportunity and ran in the front first, Zhao Shan's reserve team followed, and then came down with the Chen division who followed the king pawn across the Huaishui, the division of the feudal monarch, and the 50,000 elite soldiers, but the team of tens of thousands of people was not connected in a straight line, but mixed with the retreating Qin army.

"General, this is, this is ......" On the east bank of Huaishui, a handsome general looked at Xiang Yan stunned with an expression of 'I took off my pants, but you made me ......'. The leaders and elders of Zhuyue and Nanban who came from King Qin wanted to cut off their eyes, they were ready to sacrifice half of their warriors for the King of Chu, but now that they had not lost a single Mao, the Qin army was defeated.

"Crossing the water! Crossing the water! Xiang Yan was also annoyed, because of the rapid response of the Qin army, there was a serious disconnect in the tactical arrangement of the Chu army - only a few breakthroughs of the Chu army crossed the Huaishui, and the rest of the soldiers were still on the east coast because there was no ferry.

"The general said, immediately cross the river in front of you and pursue the Qin people." The general was still arguing about who would cross the river first, and the envoy of Zhuyue, who was fluent in Chu language, had already conveyed Xiang Yan's order to the leader of Zhuyue.

"Crossing the water?" How can this kind of thing be more people. Walking to the edge of Huaishui, Yu Su, the leader of Yuyue, took off his huge armor, and then shouted in barbarian to the people behind him, and jumped off Huaishui with a 'poof'.

Yu Su was like this, and so were the other soldiers of Yuyue, who took off their armor and swam away. The Yue Yue went into the water, and the soldiers of Nanyue and Minyue, who were not willing to lag behind, also took off their armor and swam ashore. Cai Shizhi, who did not admit defeat, also took off his armor, jumped into the water and wanted to wade to the other side, but he was submerged by Huaishui before he reached the center of the river.

"How should this be?" More than 10,000 Yue soldiers swam away, and nearly 100,000 Chu troops had not yet crossed the river.

"The Qin army has been defeated." The war was fought to this extent, even if there were fewer Chu soldiers, Xiang Yan no longer worried about victory or defeat, and morale and organization decided that the Chu army would inevitably win this battle. "I'm only worried about the king."

"The king blesses him, and he can get out of trouble and be safe." Peng Zong certainly understood the reason why Xiang Yan ordered Wang Zu not to make a roundabout and move forward quickly.

"Only 400 iron horsemen!" When Xiang Yan arrived in Chengyang and heard that the king's entourage only had four hundred iron horsemen, the whole person was immediately stunned, he thought that no matter how few there were, there would be a thousand people.

"The Great Priest is blessed." He sighed at the end.