After nightfall, the earth became silent, although the moonlight loomed among the clouds, but the thick snow still reflected the earth into a kind of gray-white, a hundred steps away clearly visible, Li Yanqing and his entourage temporarily sheltered in the mountain temple is located in the west of the official road, surrounded by rolling hills, distributed with large forests.

At this time, in a forest a mile away from the mountain temple, Lu Fangzheng led more than a thousand bandits to quietly approach the direction of the mountain temple.

Lu Fang received the news from Liang Fangping, the transfer envoy of Hebei Province, this morning, and the price offered by Liang Fangping made his heart flutter, 10,000 stone of grain, which was undoubtedly a condition that Lu Fang, who had been troubled by grain, could not refuse.

In particular, the person to deal with is Li Yanqing, when Liang Shanjun's henchmen were troubled, Lu Fang's brother Lu Ping was a general under Zhang Cen, and he died in the hands of Li Yanqing in Bozhou, Lu Fang has always held a grudge, even if Liang Fangping only gave 1,000 stone of grain, he would not let Li Yanqing go, not to mention the temptation of 10,000 stone of grain.

Lu Fang almost poured out, except for the three teams sent out to fight the early valley and did not return, the rest of his subordinates were all taken down the mountain, a total of more than 1,000 people, the other party only had 300 village soldiers, he was bound to win this battle.

"The owner of the village, it's already a watch." One of his subordinates whispered beside Lu Fang.

"First team, kill the sentinels!"

Lu Fang gave the order, and more than a hundred soldiers quickly rushed out of the woods and ran to the foot of the low hill hundreds of steps away.

Wang Gui deployed twenty sentries around the mountain temple, and the two sentries were attracted by the frightened birds, and looked to the northeast together, only to see countless black shadows running on the snow in the distance, and the sentries were shocked and immediately shouted: "There is an enemy!" ”

A sentry galloped back to the mountain temple, rushed into the courtyard and shouted, "There is an enemy down the mountain!" ”

Wang Guiteng sat up and shouted: "If there is an enemy, get up for me!" ”

The sleeping soldiers woke up one after another, they were all asleep in armor, and the weapons were beside them, before that, Wang Gui made some arrangements, such as the crossbowmen sleeping together, and the pikemen were gathered together according to their own groups, so that it was convenient to assemble quickly.

Li Yanqing also got the news, strode out of the main hall, the soldiers were quickly lined up, Li Yanqing asked, "How many bandits are there?" How far away from us? ”

"Qi Yu Shi, the number of people is unknown, about three or four hundred steps away from us."

Li Yanqing immediately ordered: "The crossbowmen will go out to deploy first, and the pikemen will wait for orders in the courtyard." ”

Li Yanqing has rich combat experience, and the area on the top of the low post is not large, and the soldiers rushing out will not be able to play a role for a while, but will easily become the enemy's bow and arrow target.

Wang Gui roared, "Crossbowmen come with me!" ”

He ran out of the temple with a hundred crossbowmen.

Li Yanqing said to Zhang Bao again: "You take twenty brothers and sawn all the tree trunks into two-foot-long wooden piers. ”

The soldiers had cut down a dozen large pine trees on the perimeter, and they had burned only their branches, and the thick trunks were piled up outside the wall, just in time to make rolling logs.

Yue Fei slept in the wing, he was also awakened by Wang Gui's shouting, he grabbed his spear and looked out, then put his blanket on the child who was sleeping sweetly, and said in a low voice: "If you don't die tonight, I will take you home!" ”

He turned and ran outside, and when the battle came, he had to leave the fate of this child to heaven.

........

There were three ox carts parked in front of the mountain road, and the cattle had been led to the low post, but the cart could not be moved, so it could only be blocked at the entrance of the mountain road for temporary defense, at this time, several soldiers rushed down from the mountain with torches, threw the torches into the car window, and the three ox carts were quickly ignited and began to burn.

"Owner of the village, there is a fire at the foot of the mountain!" A mountain bandit watching from a tree shouted.

Lu Fang knew that they had been discovered, so he stood up and shouted, "I'll kill them!" ”

Nearly a thousand mountain bandits got up from the snow one after another, shouting and rushing in the direction of the mountain temple, and the large number of birds and finches in the woods were disturbed, forming a black oppression in the sky.

The low hill where the mountain temple is located is about 20 zhang high, the east and west sides are straight slopes, can not climb up, but the north and south sides can go up the mountain by the mountain road, at this time the mountain road above each deployed fifty crossbowmen, they are all young people in their early twenties, the physique is tall and strong, is the elite of the Xiangzhou township soldiers.

There are more than a dozen bow and arrow societies in Xiangzhou, tens of thousands of township farmers usually participate in bow and arrow training, bows and arrows are not rare, and the army's armor defense ability is increasing day by day, even the leather armor is double-layered, and iron pieces are installed in key parts such as the front and rear hearts, and the bow and arrow cannot penetrate the leather armor fifty steps away, not to mention the heavy armored cavalry of Khitan and Western Xia, so the infantry bow and arrow have been delegated to the villagers, and the army infantry is more equipped with crossbow arrows.

The township soldiers are not qualified to be equipped with military crossbows, Wang Gui is also trying to get a hundred military crossbows, and set up a crossbow team, although the crossbow used by Wang Gui's hundred crossbowmen is not the best divine arm crossbow, but it is also a good arm crossbow, the longest range is one hundred and fifty steps, and the killing range is one hundred steps, which can easily shoot through leather armor.

At this time, Li Yanqing saw clearly on the top of the mountain the bandits rushing in the distance, there were thousands of people, Li Yanqing's face was a little ugly, tonight will be a fierce battle.

Li Yanqing walked back to the compound and said loudly to the two hundred spearmen gathered in the courtyard: "The mountain is full of extremely vicious mountain bandits, there are as many as a thousand people, three times as many as us, if everyone wants to live, they can only fight hard, if they are attacked by the mountain bandits, all of us will die in this wilderness and become the food of the beasts!" ”

Li Yanqing saw that many people were pale, and continued to say loudly: "But we also have advantages, we have mountains to rely on, and we have an advantage in the terrain, as long as we hold out until dawn, reinforcements will come, I, Li Yanqing, promise you, that the reward for killing a bandit soldier will be thirty yuan, and if you are unfortunately killed, you will be compensated with one hundred yuan and fifty acres of land for your family, even if you are injured and disabled, you will have a corresponding pension!" ”

Li Yanqing first explained the benefits and disadvantages, and then encouraged, under the heavy reward, the morale of the township soldiers gradually inspired, at this time Wang Gui walked over quickly and said sharply: "I'm afraid of an egg, when Li Yushi led a thousand troops and tens of thousands of Xixia troops in Xixia to fight fiercely, it was not the same as killing the Xixia army all over the field, not to mention that these mountain bandits are just a group of rabble, there is Lao Tzu Wang Gui, which Wang Gui is here, which Wang Ba Lamb is cowardly, Lao Tzu will cut his eggs first!" ”

The blood of the soldiers was ignited, and they raised their spears and shouted, "Kill these bastards!" ”

Li Yanqing patted Wang Gui's shoulder approvingly, and walked into the main hall quickly, where several civil officials greeted him, all of them were extremely frightened, and asked gossips: "Li Yushi, how could you meet a mountain bandit?" ”

Li Yanqing shook his head, "Generally, you won't encounter it, but if it is arranged by someone with a heart, it will be difficult to say." ”

The five civil officials all understood Li Yanqing's hint, their faces suddenly turned pale, and Wang Zao said in a trembling voice: "I'll just say it!" If you shouldn't join a military prison, what good will happen to this kind of errand that offends people? ”

Li Yanqing glared at him fiercely, and then said to everyone: "Listen, everyone, the township soldiers will desperately protect everyone's safety, please stay in the main hall, try to stay away from the window, beware of being shot by stray arrows, and everyone put on leather armor and take a shield, I guarantee that everyone is safe tonight!" ”

These soldiers came up with armor and shields, and everyone stepped forward to put on their armor, at this time, Mo Jun walked up to Li Yanqing and said with a smile: "Yu Shi has forgotten the ice city plan?" ”

Li Yanqing suddenly woke up to the fact that when defending the city in winter, he would water the city wall, making the city wall extremely smooth, which greatly increased the difficulty of attacking the city, although they were earth mountains, but they could also do this, especially now that it was night, the temperature was more than ten degrees below zero, and the freezing speed would be very fast.

"Goshi, the attack from the south has begun!" Soldiers shouted at the courtyard wall.

The soldiers who began to attack from the south were the first hundred mountain bandits, but now it was only a tentative attack, and the twenty or so mountain bandits slowly climbed up the hillside, and they were also worried about the crossbowmen on them, so they tried to keep their bodies as low as possible and crawled close to the ground.

The southern slope of the hill was commanded by Yue Fei, who said to the fifty crossbowmen: "Choose your target and wait for me to shoot the first arrow!" ”

Yue Fei squatted behind a boulder, raised his huge divine arm crossbow, and aimed at the head of the enemy army two hundred steps away, only to listen to 'Click!' With a bang, a crossbow arrow shot out like lightning, and despite the night, the crossbow shot accurately into the chest of the enemy leader, and only to hear a terrible scream, the leader of the mountain bandits, who was standing on a high place commanding, fell to the ground.

Yue Fei's first arrow was an order, fifty crossbowmen had been gathering momentum for a long time, and they all shot a dense number of crossbow arrows at the enemy troops halfway up the mountainside, and more than 20 soldiers were shot dead at once, and the rest of the soldiers turned around and fled, running away towards the bottom of the mountain, and several people were still shot down by the crossbow arrows that chased from the tail.

The first round of shooting achieved good results, which greatly boosted the morale of the villagers on the mountain.