If the weather is sunny and the road is in good condition from Shule Town to Diao City, it only takes two or three days for fast horses to arrive, but it takes about ten days for an army of 10,000 people to march, Zhao Ziliang and others only have more than 100 horses, and they are not in a hurry, because of the heavy snow, they can only wait at the post station, and then go on the road after the snow stops.

The heavy snow did not stop until the next morning, the weather began to clear, and the sun came out, so Zhao Ziliang ordered the group to continue on the road.

After an hour of advancement, the team arrived at the front of the Jialu Road, a long and narrow path sandwiched between the 100-meter-high mountain walls on both sides, and the depths were gloomy and cold.

Zhao Ziliang looked at the mountain walls on both sides of this trail, frowned, he stopped his horse, raised his palms and shouted: "Stop advancing!" ”

Cen Shen, who followed up, asked, "General, why did you stop?" ”

Zhao Ziliang was looking at the situation on the mountain walls on both sides of the front, Wei Meng, Huo Kan, Wang Can and others also stepped forward, Huo Kan said with a solemn expression: "General, my subordinates feel that the situation in front seems to be a little wrong, but I don't know what's wrong!" ”

Zhao Ziliang pointed to the mountain walls on both sides with a horsewhip and said: "There are small birds chirping out to feed all along the way, and this place is indeed so secluded that there is no sound, don't you think it's strange?" ”

Wei Meng slapped his head when he heard this: "Yes, I also feel that something is wrong, but I can't think of anything wrong, when I heard the general say this, I remembered that there must be people on the mountain walls on both sides!" ”

Zhao Ziliang remembered Mrs. Meng's flying pigeon herald reminder, and immediately said: "Is there anyone, just send someone to see, Wang Can!" ”

Wang Can arched his hand and said, "Yes!" ”

"Send two men and horses to climb the cliff to investigate the situation, and if there are ambushes, immediately warn!"

"No!"

Under Wang Can's assignment, the two teams of knights dismounted and climbed up the mountains on both sides, and the rest of the people lined up in a defensive formation under the command of Zhao Ziliang

At this time, on the mountain wall on the left, Yun Dingtian saw Zhao Ziliang and others stop in front of Jialu Road, and saw two teams of Tang troops dismounted and quickly climbed up the mountain with weapons in hand, he clenched his fist and beat the stone in front of him unwillingly: "Hey, I didn't expect this Zhao Ziliang to be so vigilant, this is the hinterland of Anxi, he is not going to fight, just going to take office, but he is so cautious!" ”

A horse bandit leader next to him laughed and said: "I have often heard how brave this Zhao Ziliang is, but when I see it today, he is so timid as a mouse, he doesn't even dare to go over a mountain path!" ”

Another horse bandit shook his head and said: "This has nothing to do with cowardice, I guess Zhao Ziliang must have found something abnormal to stop his men and horses, knowing that something was wrong in front of him and leading people and horses to break inside, this is not bold, but stupid!" Big boss, you see, these two teams of Tang troops are quickly climbing up the mountain, and as long as they are halfway up the mountain, they will find us! ”

Yun Dingtian was silent for a long time, and it was not until the Tang army of the two teams of detectives was about to reach the halfway point of the mountain that he gritted his teeth and said: "It seems that the sneak attack will not succeed, for the sake of today's plan, the only way to rely on the terrain is to rush down from the top of the mountain on both sides!" ”

A horse bandit agreed: "Yes, this will definitely break up the Tang army's formation, and then besiege Zhao Ziliang!" ”

Yun Dingtian said to the people around him: "Wave the flag to the brothers on the opposite side and rush down together!" ”

After his horse bandits sent a signal to the people on the opposite side, Yun Dingtian ordered: "Leave a dozen people to push the stones down to block the road, and the others rush down with Lao Tzu!" ”

"No!"

Yun Dingtian pulled out his saber and raised it to the sky and shouted: "Brothers, rush with Lao Tzu!" ”

"Kill!"

Although the slope of the mountain is not steep, but there is no road, it is completely impossible to rush down the mountain on horseback, but I am afraid that before rushing to the bottom of the mountain, the horses will fall because the horses have broken their feet, and the horse bandits abandon their horses, and the horse bandits all hold weapons and rush down on foot from the slopes on both sides, causing an extremely huge momentum, and the two teams of Tang soldiers who have just climbed halfway up the mountain changed color after seeing it, and they turned around and ran down the mountain.

Zhao Ziliang snorted coldly when he saw it: "Sure enough, there is an ambush!" Everyone obeyed the order, all dismounted, and lined up in five rows, squatting in the front two rows, and standing in the back three rows! ”

The soldiers were ordered to dismount and drive their horses aside, and some gathered their horses to the rear, and the soldiers lined up in their place.

Zhao Ziliang raised his hand and shouted: "Two hundred and fifty steps of bows and arrows are ready!" Ten columns on the left, the enemy in front of the left side of the target; Ten columns on the right, the enemy in front of the right side of the target".

In the Tang Dynasty, the development of weapons and bows and arrows has made progress far beyond that of previous dynasties, and metallurgical technology has made the Tang army's weapons extremely sharp, and the range of bows and arrows has also been greatly improved.

The soldiers took out their bows and arrows one after another, the arrows were obliquely upward, and Zhao Ziliang waved his hand down: "Release the arrows-".

"Whoosh ・・・・・・".

The horse bandits who were still on the hillside were suddenly hit by a rain of arrows, and from time to time someone was hit by an arrow, and then rolled down the hillside.

After a few rounds of arrow rain, the horse bandits suffered a lot of casualties, but they did not care, and they continued to rush down the hillside. Zhao Ziliang and the others finally saw the true face of the enemy, it turned out to be a group of horse bandits, but this group of horse bandits was unusual, these horse bandits rushed down without any chaos, all of them were extremely brave, and they were not afraid of the shooting of bows and arrows.

After seven or eight rounds of arrows, the horse bandits have suffered more than 100 casualties, and the cavalry of one hundred and twenty people under Zhao Ziliang are all elite, whether it is foot combat, cavalry combat or bow and arrow, they are all experts, and the bow and arrow shooting is extremely accurate.

The horse bandits had already rushed to the foot of the mountain, and the horse bandits who rushed down from the left and right sides began to converge and continue to rush towards the Tang army, which was only one hundred and fifty steps away from the Tang army.

Zhao Ziliang immediately shot tactics with bows and arrows, and he shouted: "The whole army will deploy a circular formation for defense!" The first row changed the spears, the second and third rows changed the swords and shields, and the fourth and fifth rows continued to shoot arrows at the enemy, shooting freely! Non-combatants gather in the middle of the formation and erect shields to protect themselves and are not allowed to move at will".

After hearing Zhao Ziliang's order, the soldiers in the first row threw down their horn bows and picked up the spears placed on the ground, and then quickly spread out to form a circle, aiming the spears at the outside of the formation, and the others were kept in the middle of the circle by them.

The men of the second and third rows dropped their horned bows and drew their swords at their waists, and stood next to the pikemen of the first row with shields on their left and right, and the round shields in front of them, while the soldiers of the fourth and fifth rows continued to shoot arrows at the rushing horse bandits, and almost one of them fell from each arrow.

Among Zhao Ziliang's group, Cen Shen, Chen Mingqian and several of his apprentices were non-combatants, and each of them picked up a shield dropped by the soldiers in the first row to block it above their heads.

At this time, there were also people in the rear of the horse bandits who began to shoot arrows at the side of the Tang army, and the Tang army had already prepared. The pikemen had the sword and shield men around them to help block the arrows, while the archers hid behind the sword and shield men, and in the formation, Zhao Ziliang, Wei Meng, Huo Kan, Wang Can and others rode on their horses and kept waving their weapons to block the flying arrows, and the non-combatants also used their shields to protect themselves well.

The horse bandits were still rushing forward in addition to paying more than a hundred casualties, Zhao Ziliang couldn't help but be curious about these people, obviously, the leaders of these horse bandits must be people who know the soldiers, otherwise they would not have trained these horse bandits who are not afraid of death, ordinary horse bandits will definitely collapse after such a large number of casualties, but these horse bandits are not.

If it weren't for the huge difference in strength, Zhao Ziliang would not have put up this circular formation to defend, only a hundred more people, he would line up in an attack formation to kill and defeat the opponent in one fell swoop.

The horse bandits rushed to the front of the Tang army, and it was only fifty paces away. Suddenly, Zhao Ziliang saw a person with a somewhat familiar face, this must be a horse bandit leader, why is he so familiar? Who is he?

Zhao Ziliang quickly remembered, wasn't this person Yun Dingtian, the bandit leader of the Wind Thieves he met in the North Warehouse of Shule Town? Unexpectedly, Bian Lingcheng actually found this person!

Zhao Ziliang immediately took out his bow and arrow and aimed it at Yun Dingtian and released an arrow, his bow was a three-stone bow, which was the strongest bow in the entire Shule Town Army, and only a few people used this kind of strong attack, because the others couldn't pull it away at all.

Hundreds of pounds of strength, this arrow can be described as fast, accurate and ruthless, Yun Dingtian suddenly felt dangerous, he instinctively dodged, but it was too late, the arrow did not hit his chest, but hit his shoulder, the arrow shot through the leather armor on his body and hit an iron plate under the leather armor, the huge impact force knocked him upside down and flew out and fell to the ground.