The earth was white under the gray sky, the flying snowflakes were as big as the palms of a child's hands, and the biting cold wind shrouded the north and south of the Tianshan Mountains. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

The army was huge, more than 40,000 men, but they were not the army of Tukhi. It is unbelievable that there would be other armies in the territory ruled by the Turks, and on such snowy days, but this army was not a special force sent by any country to attack the Turks, and it was still the army of the Turks in terms of affiliation.

The commander of this army was Ye Erxian, who was once the king of Tuqi Zuoxian, and in the rebellion launched by Anbalturi last year, Ye Erxian lost the entire Western Regions and fled back to Tuqi alone. Therefore, he was severely punished by the Great Khan Abicheril, and had to atone for his crimes to destroy his friend King Chalaharman's Gaochang Kingdom, and assist the Great Khan in quelling the rebellion of Anbalturi.

But it didn't end there. After the rebellion was crushed, although the fleeing Anbalturi was killed by the Tibetan Zanpu Gesang and the head was returned to Abicheril, Abicheril was still angry, and he was very dissatisfied with the thirteen tribes that followed Anbalturi and the countries of the Western Regions that later surrendered.

Given that the Gaochang kingdoms at both ends of the first rat had been completely wiped out, and that the other Ambalture tribe had fled westward, Abicheril had no choice but to behead all the remaining Ramandel tribes, so he transferred his anger to the thirteen tribes and the Western Regions.

All the leaders of the thirteen tribes were executed and new chiefs appointed, all the boys of the clan were taken hostage, the girls were given as slaves to meritorious officers, and all men of appropriate age who did not die in battle were conscripted into the Turbid army. The rest of the thirteen were all old and weak women, so that they could hardly pose any threat.

For the Western Regions, Abicilir had all the kings cut themselves off, and the children of the new kings were all sent to Dragon City as hostages, and all men between the ages of eighteen and forty in these countries were forcibly recruited to join the battle sequence of the Turks.

In addition to venting his anger, Abicil did this for other reasons. This was not only to deprive the Western Regions of the human resources for another rebellion, but also to replenish the Tukchi army itself.

In the wars with the Silk Country, the Turks have lost a considerable number of troops, and these losses have exceeded the limits of the Turk's own ability to replenish troops, which has also caused the decline in the combat capability of the Turky army in recent years. That's why Abichilir took this opportunity to forcibly recruit these human resources to join the Turgis Army, he didn't expect these improvised patchwork troops to have any combat effectiveness, but at least these people could be used as meat shields for the Turgis to block the arrows, swords and guns of the Silk Country.

The general who was ordered to receive this rabble was naturally Ye Erxian, who had already made up for it, and he did not expect to be able to restore himself to the position of King Zuoxian, and he did not even expect to be able to restore the position of Zuo Duhu, he understood that it was an extrajudicial favor for Abichilir to let him lead this army back to Tuqi, especially after he met the beheaded tribal leaders and the kings who were forced to cut themselves.

The problem is that this army is not ready to be drawn if it wants to. First of all, these more than 40,000 people are not in one place, but scattered among many small countries, some small countries even have only a few dozen people to participate, to gather the armies of so many countries to form an army, and also to prepare the corresponding food, clothing, tents and other materials during the period of the Raid, that is not a day or two can be prepared, to put it bluntly, these materials still have to be pieced together by various small countries.

Of course, Abicil and his army of Tukhe did not have time to wait, so he gave Ye'er a deadline - they must rush to Dragon City before the snow melts next year, and then return east with his army.

was left to clean up such a mess, Ye Er couldn't say anything about his suffering. The Western Regions had just experienced this great turmoil, and all countries had been affected by the war to varying degrees, and Abicheril's brutal suppression would inevitably cause dissatisfaction among these small countries, but they were afraid of the strong military power of the Turks and did not dare to speak out. Now Abicheril shook his hand and left, leaving Ye'er to face these disgruntled countries and a whole bunch of problems to solve. So Ye Er first had to find a way to appease these countries, and on the other hand, he had to fight with these countries to collect supplies, and on the other hand, he had to arrange the security of his army after it left, and there were so many things to do. Even an able official like Ye Erxian, who had been entrenched in the Western Regions for many years, was so busy that he finally stopped arranging everything, and it was already winter.

Theoretically, once it is winter, this march is almost impossible, because once the heavy snow falls, the army will only march more than ten miles a day, and the time to reach Dragon City will be greatly extended, so the problem of supply will be more difficult. But Ye Er didn't have a choice, because the time limit given to him by Abichilir could only come to the beginning of spring next year, so Ye Er could only order the army to pull out.

The route he chose was to take the southern foot of the Tianshan Mountains and pass through the hometown of Gaochang Kingdom to Longcheng, which was almost the route taken by Abicheril to quell the rebellion, but in the opposite direction. Ye'er took this road first because the winter here is relatively warmer, and the snowfall will be less, but the biggest problem with this route is the last section, now there is no need to go to the past, if you go to Longcheng from the south road, you may encounter the guerrilla cavalry of the Silk Country, of course, these 40,000 people will not be afraid of a small group of cavalry, but if the other party attracts the army of the Silk Country, then it is very problematic whether these poorly trained troops can retreat in their entirety.

It's a pity that Ye Erxian was unlucky, and it snowed heavily as soon as he walked to the foot of the Tianshan Mountain, and it rained for seven or eight days in a row without the slightest intention of decreasing. There were a large number of frostbitten people in the army that had to be stationed, and seeing that time was pressing, Ye Er had to take risks and forcibly lead this army forward in the snow. The suffering of this can only be experienced by those who have really walked through, and Ye Erxian lost more than 400 people in the two-day march, not including the thousands of people who fled. At this time, Ye Er didn't have the energy to chase down the fleeing person at all, because if he pursued in such bad weather, he was afraid that even the pursuer would freeze to death on the road.

Immortal God, are you really going to push me into a corner? Ye Erxian's heart shouted over and over again. Unfortunately, Changshengtian did not give him any comfort, when the wind and snow stopped six days later, he had lost twenty percent of his troops forever, and as many as half of the soldiers were frostbitten to varying degrees, and in front of them was a vast expanse of snow and a road that was difficult to walk.

There are very few descriptions of this army's expedition in historical sources, but they all invariably write that when Ye Er arrived in Dragon City first in the spring of the following year, there were only about 8,000 people left in this army of more than 40,000 people. A significant number of them died in Baijiantan. (To be continued.) )