"General, the last general doesn't quite understand the general's intentions, why did he order the right army to move closer to the middle army? Could it be that the general is preparing for a decisive battle with the Khitans? The subordinates were very puzzled by Zhao Ziliang's deployment and asked directly.

Zhao Ziliang patted a handful of mosquitoes attached to his face, shook his head and said: "For the time being, it is not the time for a decisive battle with the Khitans, with the current strength of our army, a decisive battle with the Khitans will suffer, and now the Xi people have issued a call for all small tribes to go to converge and prepare to concentrate their forces against our army, of course our army cannot go at the pace of the Khitans!" ”

"Our army came all the way north, almost all the large and small tribes along the way have been wiped out by our army, and the rest are still further north, of which the west is bordered by the Turks, the eastern Qarluq, and the Hui, so there are not many Khitan tribes in the west, and they are all small tribes, the Khitans are mainly in the east, so that the right army and the Chinese army are closer, the purpose is to concentrate the strength of our army, and all the Khitan tribes that came from the east to prepare to join the Xi tribe were all wiped out, and then our army concentrated all the forces to fight a decisive battle with the Xi people! There is a little bit of a point of reinforcement! ”

After listening to Zhao Ziliang's plan, the generals suddenly realized, but someone asked: "General, the Xi clan won't watch us encircle and send reinforcements, right?" Besides, the Xi people are not really besieged, if they learn that we are attacking other Khitan tribes who are coming, won't the Xi people raise troops to flank us? ”

Zhao Ziliang nodded: "Yes, the Xi people will definitely not watch us eliminate the other Khitan tribes that came from the east, so we can't let them get the slightest news, and order the Whirlwind Eighteen Cavalry to take over the vanguard army of Brehan with two hundred elite cavalry, investigate all the movements of the Xi army, and carry out annihilating strikes against the Xi scouts and sentinels!" If the Xi army moves closer to our army, we must report it quickly! ”

"No!"

After the Whirlwind Eighteen Cavalry was sent out, Zhao Ziliang felt a little relieved, with the ability of the Whirlwind Eighteen Cavalry, not only could they be a hundred, but also could carry out the most dangerous and extremely difficult reconnaissance and espionage activities, not to mention that they still had two hundred elite cavalry in their hands, even if they encountered two or three thousand cavalry, they were not afraid.

Xi tooth tent.

Nu Jun walked around the big tent with the hilt of his sword, and the colorful peacock feathers on his hat shook endlessly, and suddenly a shout of "report-" came into the big tent one after another from far and near.

"Report - report to the Great Khan, the scouts know that the vanguard of the Tang Army, Brehan, has led the army to return south, but there is an extremely powerful scout cavalry snooping near our camp, and the scouts sent by our army one after another have gone and never returned!"

"What? Brehan led his troops back south? Leaving behind a squad of scouts? How many people are there? Nu asked.

"About two hundred people, but they are scattered, and sometimes they are gathered together!"

Nu Du, who was in his forties, frowned, he had always looked down on the Hedong Army, but he was extremely afraid of the Shuo Fang Army, just because the Shuo Fang Army made Wang Zhonghei extremely brave and extremely strong in commanding the troops, he was not an opponent at all, and he was defeated three times, and only a few thousand people fled back from tens of thousands of horses.

Nu Jun looked at the shaman sitting in the shadow in the corner of the big tent and asked, "Great wizard, how about Ben Khan want to send someone to kill this Hedong army scout?" ”

The shaman's old hoarse voice came from the corner: "How many men and horses is the Great Khan going to send to kill this scout?" There are more than 200 of them, and if you want to kill them completely, you have to send at least a thousand horsemen, right? How many thousand horsemen do we have left? The southerners have always been cunning, but they don't know that this may be a ploy of the southerners, wanting to attract our army to send a small force over, and then destroy it, and use this method to eat our army one by one? ”

Nu Du was suddenly out of idea by the shaman's words, he scratched his ears and cheeks, and a few deep wrinkles appeared on his forehead, "This ・・・・・・・ but we can't do nothing, who knows what the hell Tang Jun is doing?" If they are carrying out some kind of conspiracy at this time, and we do not see through it, will our army suffer a great loss at that time? ”

The corner of the big tent was silent for a while, and the hoarse voice came out again: "The Great Khan's consideration is not without certain reason, in this case, the Great Khan might as well send a team of 1,000 people to test this Nanren scout, if the 1,000-man team still goes back and has no return, then there is no need to send a large army over, just wait for the tribes to come to converge and have a decisive battle with the Tang army, if this Nanren scout is eliminated, the Great Khan will send a large number of scouts to find out the movement of the Nanren army!" ”

Angry and overjoyed, he hurriedly said: "Then ask the great wizard to do a divination and check the good luck!" ”

The old hoarse voice let out a sigh: "Then please ask the Great Khan to kill the sheep and take the bones!" ”

The angry people immediately shouted: "Come on, slaughter a ram!" ”

Soon someone went to carry it out, and out of the gloom of the big tent came an old man with tattered clothes, full of hair, and an extremely old face, whose skin was wrinkled and covered with age spots, this old man was tall and thin, with dry skin on his hands, and his fingers were as thin as birds' claws, and he was clutching a staff of strange shape, and his tattered clothes were hung with bells of various sizes, and he walked with a clanging sound.

The great wizard walked out of the tent and began to gather his disciples and servants to arrange the altar, and the herdsmen and thousands of troops of the Xi tribe were also ordered to come to watch the ceremony, and it didn't take long for the altar to be arranged, and a large number of herdsmen and Xi armies had gathered around the altar.

The forms of tribal sacrifices in the northern steppes are almost the same, and this sacrificial ritual is about the same as that of the Huns in ancient times, with slight changes.

After the altar was arranged, the great wizard sat in the middle of the altar and closed his eyes and recited incantations, while dozens of his disciples sang and danced around the altar, and the attendant servants beat various musical instruments.

As the sacrificial ceremony progressed, a Khitan man carried a tray on the altar and knelt beside the great wizard, on the tray there was a fresh leg of mutton bone, the great wizard took off the leg of mutton bone with both hands very reverently, held it on the palm of his hand, and recited words in his mouth.

After a long time, the great wizard had finished his incantation, and threw the leg of mutton into the brazier in front of him with both hands, and he began to dance wildly around the brazier.

After a few minutes, the leg of mutton bones thrown into the brazier began to burn, and the great wizard also stopped in sweat at this time and squatted by the brazier to watch the leg bones burn, so as to judge the good luck of the battle.

The leg of mutton finally burst open, and the Great Wizard walked down the altar in a haggard manner, walking towards the Great Khan's tent, and Nu and his 10,000 captains and 1,000 commanders immediately followed.

After the tribal lords entered the big tent, they couldn't wait to ask, "Great wizard, what is the result of the divination?" ”

The Great Wizard said in an extremely frightened tone: "The boundless blood clouds, the corpses and tattered flags all over the ground, the scene of my Khitan prosperity after two hundred years is gone・・・・・・."

Angry's heart was beating wildly when he heard this, and a bad premonition came to his heart, "Great Wizard, what does this mean?" You can make it clear! ”

"I can't tell, I can't tell ・・・・・・" The great wizard said these two sentences and never said a word again, no matter how angry he urged, he just didn't say a word.

"Hey-" Nu Du sighed, if it weren't for the fact that this great wizard had too good prestige in the hearts of the Khitans, he would definitely use unconventional means to make him understand.

In fact, when the great wizard said those words, Nu Du felt that this war was only afraid that it would be unfavorable to his side, and he wanted to order the whole clan to move north, but multiple concerns made him unable to make this determination, first, if it was in previous years, at this time, he had already led the army south into the territory of the Tang Dynasty to fight the grass valley, after all, only the grass and meat on the grassland could not let the clansmen, livestock and horses survive the cold winter, and now the situation has completely changed, the Tang army actually went deep into the Mobei grassland to raid the gathering places of various tribes, Killing his people, taking away all the cattle, sheep and horses, if the tribe now retreats to the territory of the Tongluo people further north, it is not known whether the Tongluo people will accept them or be hostile to them, and then there is the question of how to survive the winter, if they do not stock up on sufficient food and exercises, many people and livestock will surely freeze to death in winter; Second, he had already discussed with the Great Wizard, and ordered the other Khitan tribes to move closer to the tooth tent for convergence, and concentrate superior forces to fight a decisive battle with the Tang Army's Hedong Army, if they retreated north into Tongluo at this time, it would be tantamount to losing trust with other Khitan tribes, and the prestige of the Xi tribe in the entire Khitan would be lost, and perhaps these tribes would be devastated by the Tang Army, and then the entire Khitan would be greatly weakened, and there was a danger of being annexed by other tribes on the grassland.

After thinking about it for a long time, Nu Du still decided to send a team of 1,000 people to test the reality of the Tang army, and he shouted: "Yeluhan! ”

The commander of the thousand, Yeluhan, went out to stroke his chest and bowed down and said, "What does the Great Khan command?" ”

"Order you to lead a thousand cavalry to destroy the Tang Army scout cavalry on the opposite side, and send someone back to report at any time!"

"The Great Khan rest assured, he will definitely live up to his mission!" Jeluhan flicked his wolf's skin as he spoke, and turned to leave.

In a short time, a thousand-man cavalry gathered near the tent, and the neighing of horses and the shouts of the knights continued to be heard, and under the leadership of Jeluhan, the thousand-man regiment soon left the tent and headed south, and the sound of horses' hooves gradually faded away until it disappeared.

At this time, more than forty miles south of the Xi people's tooth tent, the whirlwind eighteen horsemen were camping at the foot of the blue wolf mountain with two hundred elite horses, and everyone gathered around a few fires to roast and barbecue meat, talking and laughing while eating.

A shout was accompanied by the sound of horses' hooves coming from a distance, and in a few breaths a knight came out of the darkness to the camp.

"Report - Xuanda people, the Xi people have sent a team of 1,000 people who are rapidly approaching our department, according to which it is less than thirty miles!"

"Oh?" Xuan Yi stood up, his brain teasers started quickly, and after a few breaths, he immediately ordered: "Put out the fire, the whole army is divided into three detachments, the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth with sixty people, three hundred horses as the target on the bright side is always in front to attract the attention of the Xi army, I want to take the nineth, tenth, eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth lang with seventy people and two hundred horses to intercept the rear of the enemy army, and the second with fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, and eighteen with seventy people as reserves, Always ready to pick up me and the third, once a raid is completed, the roles of the three detachments will be immediately switched, the second will lead the team to attract the enemy's attention in the light, I will lead the team to be responsible for the response, and the third will lead the team to be responsible for the raid on the rear of the enemy army, and so on, all understand? ”

"Understood!" (To be continued.) )