Like the Han people, this Niu Lu really exclaimed: "When did the Ming army become so weak? ”

Everyone has the same feeling, although three of the four roads of the Ming army of Salhu were broken, and the Jin side won a complete victory, but when the juniper road was broken, it was also quite passive, and was once pressed and beaten by the juniper department. Later, when Shenyang was broken, the super combat power of Neiding led by the chief soldier He Shixian broke out, which made everyone admire. When it came to the bloody battle of the Hunhe River, all the Eight Banner soldiers who participated in that battle were full of respect for the Daming Sichuan Army who fought to the end, and many of them were seriously injured in the bloody battle of the Hunhe River, and they could not forget the forest of spears and the blood in the sky until they died.

Until the apocalypse two years ago, the Ming army has always taken the initiative to invite the war, and later when the expedition to Liaoxi, there were occasional battles, although a while ago I heard that a bull in the blue flag defeated the Ming country over a thousand iron cavalry, and also beheaded a deputy general and a general, but the situation in front of me is still extremely surprising, it is incredible.

"The Ming army may also lure the enemy deeper." A Niu Lu Zhangjing said with a solemn face: "This is just right to match last night's large-scale attack." ”

"That's true." Niu Lu nodded and said, "I will report to the masters above and see how they make decisions." ”

Everyone nodded, and the entire Niu Lu spread out to be on guard to prevent the Ming army from suddenly attacking in a big way.

After more than half an hour, this Niu Lu Ezhen and the other two Niu Lu, plus a large number of Han army Baoyi, received an order from Baduli, ordering them to all ride war horses and begin to search and move forward to the east to see whether the Ming army was a small force of sentinel cavalry or a large attack.

As expected, the Thirteen Mountains still maintained the posture of the main force and heavy troops, and sure enough, the Jurchen defenders still knew who was light and who was heavy, and compared with the soldiers and horses of the Thirteen Mountains, the Ming army was not in trouble at all.

Cao Zhenyan and his team continued to be on guard, originally they should be able to go back to rest, but the situation was serious, all the rotating personnel came out of the resting place, and the female Allah above could not consider that these Han people had been patrolling for hours, hungry and sleepy, and urgently needed to rest.

In the forest, the old official road, the barren fields and the shrub area, everywhere are Jurchen bannermen wearing blue arrow suits, cotton armor or chain mail, the whole front stretches for a long time, and the team is pulled apart, because the Ming army does not appear in large groups, even if it suddenly comes now, the Ming army that has not been set up and lined up is not any threat, there may only be a small-scale Ming army attack, that is not a big problem, this side is already ready.

Cao Zhenyan, like the Jurchen Qiding, was also like all the Han army coats, taking off his bow and arrows in front of him, and the arrows were also on the bowstring.

Some of the cavalry who have practiced throwing are holding throwing guns in their hands, and if they suddenly encounter a small group of Ming cavalry, throwing spears and throwing axes, broadswords, bones and other throwing items can also get a good effect.

Crystal snowflakes kept falling in the white forest, and the gray-blue knights rode slowly through the woods and shrubs and abandoned villages, and their horses made loud snorts from time to time, and people's breath formed a cloud of white mist, one after another, like a giant snake winding for miles, circling and twisting.

The snow has long since stopped.

The snow fell early and the wind was strong, so although it didn't stop all night, the snow wasn't deep.

There were also quite a few places where the black earth was bare, speckled and quite glaring in the vast whiteness.

There are constantly earthy gray abandoned buildings appear in front of people's eyes, here is the official road to Quang Ninh, Quang Ninh was the political and military center of Liao town with a population of millions, on the road to Quang Ninh, especially near the city gate, there are large and small market towns, a few years later, it has become a barren hill, only the old house foundation still exists.

The cavalry of several hundred men formed a long, sloppy line, and after several miles of marching, finally found another Ming army.

It is still the same cavalry team, bright armor, quite luxurious equipment, the Red Red Army flag is held diagonally, the Ming army is drinking and eating, and it seems that no guards have been dispatched.

The wind was heavy and the snow was cold, and the morale of these Ming troops was of course quite low, and when they saw the Jurchens approaching, the people here even heard bursts of exclamations.

Cao Zhenyan shook his head...... What the fuck is going on?

The Jurchens were also a little surprised, they had been confronting the Ming army here for several years, and there was no shortage of people who came to guard again. Two years ago, the Ming army was not such a performance, brave, daring to fight, often took the initiative to launch a cavalry battle of dozens of people, and both sides will have gains, but most of the final winners are still Jurchens, even if there are soldiers killed in battle, the Ming army has no way to get the head in the end.

After a brief hesitation, the Jurchen Niu Lu Ezhen, who was in charge of the search operation, decided to move on, only to speed up his horse and adjust the team that was too far away.

Several Jurchens and Han Chinese of Niulu were assembled and pressed towards the Ming army opposite.

Not surprisingly, there were at least two miles to go, and the Ming army had already turned around and fled, and the ranks were quite chaotic, or rather, there was no queue at all.

The Ming army fled like a swarm of bees, and it was the same as what happened to Cao Zhenyan and them before.

In the afternoon, similar news came from other fronts, a large force of Ming cavalry appeared, and most of them took the initiative to retreat after encountering the Houjin soldiers, only a small group of Ming cavalry insisted on fighting an encounter with the Jurchens, the results were of course self-evident, before dark, the Jurchen cavalry who returned to the camp began to happily show off the Ming armor they had captured, as well as battle flags, war horses, and all kinds of sharp weapons.

Of course, it also includes firearms like the three-eyed gun, and they have no interest in the firearms of the Ming army, the Jurchens, most of them don't know how to use them, and they also feel that this thing is too powerful, and there are quite risks.

A large number of muskets of the three-eyed gun were thrown directly back to the ground, and some Han people who were not skilled in bow and arrow archery were picked up, so that they could still sound during battle, and they could also help the Jurchen knights train their war horses in normal times.

Before dark, a military meeting was held at the top of the Jurchen leadership, including Baduli, and everyone including Cao Zhenyan seized the time to rest.

No one knows if a real big war will break out tomorrow.

Everyone is paying attention to the movements of the Thirteen Mountains, and the elite of the Jurchens are still staying in place to defend, and the main defensive target is still the movements of the Thirteen Mountains.

At the same time, the high-level sent Tang Ma to urgently ask for help from the grain protection team on the west side of Quang Ninh.

In the last year and the year before last, when the grain team was particularly numerous and important, there were as many as five or six thousand soldiers of the Eight Banners who guarded the grain, and there were more than 10,000 plough teams that carried grain back and forth along the border wall of the northern part of Shenyang along the border wall of Guangning and then to the north of Shenyang, so that more than one million stone of grain was continuously sent to Liaodong, and when they attached importance to the grain route, the high-level leaders of the Jurchen aristocracy of course spared no effort, and now that the trade has been cut off and grain imports have been greatly reduced, the team of grain guards is about 2,000 people. Moreover, they are scattered in an area of several hundred miles, mainly to eliminate those endless Mongolian horse thieves, and at the same time to deter the Horqin tribes from appearing dissenting again, as for the protection of grain, it is already a secondary task.

The possibility of reinforcements appearing is not very high, at most it will involve the deployment of the Thirteen Mountains at the eastern exit, preventing them from rushing out of Xixinkou with all their might.

After several years of siege, the combat effectiveness of the defenders on the Thirteen Hills has been widely recognized...... Including the Jurchen high-level, they all admitted that the defenders on the Thirteen Mountains were much more difficult than the Ming army.

……

After dawn, Cao Zhenyan and the others woke up from the cold and hunger as usual, and a few of the people who were on duty had already shoveled the snow, boiled a pot of boiling water in a dilapidated iron pot, and then everyone fetched water and ate multigrain cakes with water.

This kind of multigrain cake is not everyone can be full, in the winter to spring of the great famine, a stone of grain sold for dozens of taels of high price, a piece of multigrain cake is not only a cake, may be a person's life for several days, even now, every coat is not full, their strong physique has long begun to overdraw vitality, when their body is so thin that they are skinny, they are shaking when they walk, and they are completely incapable of continuing to fight or farm for their masters, life is also coming to an end.

This is the fate of Baoyi, this fate will gradually improve after a few years, and those who can survive are those who are lucky enough to go against the sky.

Cao Zhenyan has a poor appetite, and the running and guarding for several days in a row have seriously consumed the spirit of this young man, of course, it is mainly reflected in physical fitness.

In fact, almost everyone is the same, feeling stiff with gestures and feet, and there is no expression on their faces, like a group of living walking dead.

The Jurchens were no better, and there were several night attacks last night, and the scale was much larger than the previous night, so many of the Jurchens rose up to take turns on guard, which made them exhausted.

It was all too common for a few of them to be kicked to the ground, lying in the snow and being whipped with a horsewhip, while the rest were watching indifferently.

After the rising sun, Tangma sent the order of the supreme general, and today Baduli decided to select more than 1,000 troops and take the initiative to attack the main force of the Ming army stationed more than ten miles away.

The position of the main force of the Ming army was determined after yesterday's all-day advance and search, as well as a small-scale cavalry battle, from the Ming army's original garrison in Qiantun and Jinzhou to here, the original distance was less than 100 li, and then the Ming army should have advanced for many days, and built a temporary camp more than ten miles west of the Thirteen Mountains.

The next step is to send cavalry to sentry, and the cavalry sent out are all defeated without exception, which will have a serious impact on the judgment of the Ming generals, and then they will fall into a dilemma.

Because there was no way to determine the strength of the Jurchens and the deployment of the camp, there was no way to judge the holes in the Jurchen defenses through small-scale cavalry battles, and there was no initial confidence to help the generals determine their determination.

Under such circumstances, it was almost impossible for the Ming army to take the initiative to initiate a battle, but the Jurchens determined the strategic advantage step by step, so under the premise that there was no large-scale attack on the side of the Thirteen Mountains, the Jurchen high-level decided to take the initiative to launch a tentative attack, not necessarily to obtain much results, but to measure the combat effectiveness of the Ming cavalry now, and how determined the generals were to open the encirclement. ...