Chapter 63 - Breaking the Formation
When he received the report that the commander of Qingshan, Li Meng, had died in battle and that Qingshan was about to be lost, Lu Xuan only felt dizzy.
These days, he and Cheng Yun are busy dealing with Su Chengdong's all-out attack, and in the confrontation again and again, the two of them are constantly going back and forth to the most critical places on the front to save the situation, and they never expected to ignore that the situation on the Qingshan side has changed. And this is precisely the most unlikely situation!
Lu Xuan's judgment was completely correct, the focus of the Silk Country's attack would be biased towards the direction of Qingshan, and he also arranged the most elite forces, the largest number of troops, and the most complete formation configuration in Qingshan. With the help of the terrain and defense facilities in the Qingshan area, Lu Xuan reasonably equipped the troops for defense. As long as they do not take advantage of the enemy's temptation and leave their existing positions, unless their forces are depleted to the point where they can no longer maintain the battle line, the army of the Silk Country will not want to conquer this place.
But now that it has only been six days since the war began, the Qingshan region is facing the crisis of falling! Lu Xuan ordered the messenger who came to report the news to explain in detail how the battle had evolved to this point, and after listening to the envoy's account, he couldn't help but regret it.
It turned out that the situation of the battle had changed from the fourth day. On the road from Qingshan to Shibijing, there is a place called Xianli, although this place is small, it is a very important point, if this place is lost, then the traffic between Qingshan and Shibijing must be detoured more than 70 miles, so Goryeo is equipped with 1,500 elite soldiers here, although this place has not suffered too much attack from the country of silk before, Bai Zhaishan still does not dare to send a soldier from here to relieve the crisis in other places.
In the early hours of the fourth day, Clam Li was suddenly attacked by the Silk Country, and its scale caught the defenders here by surprise. A fierce assault of 8,000 men, plus a large amount of siege equipment. Gao Dingbian simply concentrated all the attack forces that could be mobilized at hand. The outcome of the battle was obvious, and the Goryeo defenders were completely annihilated after half a day of fighting. Clam Lane lost. However, the Silk Country also caused nearly 2,000 people to die in the battle, and it was a fierce battle that was evenly matched.
The loss of Clam was already expected by Li Meng, since Gao Dingbian had concentrated so much strength, which was far beyond the level that Clam Li could bear, then it was a matter of time before it fell. However, the defenders of Clam delayed for half a day with their lives, which provided sufficient preparation time for Li Meng to mobilize his troops in time to launch a counteroffensive, and such a fierce attack by the Silk Country was almost equivalent to destroying all the existing defensive facilities in Clam Li, so that once the Goryeo army launched a counterattack, the Silk Country would be in no danger to defend. Li Meng concentrated 10,000 men to attack. This would inevitably result in huge casualties on both sides, and the main purpose of the Goryeo Army was to deplete the enemy's living forces, and everyone in the army understood that they were giving their lives to win a chance for the city of Pyongyang to survive.
Almost at the same time that the Silk Country occupied the clam ri, the Goryeo army had already begun to counterattack, and the interval was so short that it was not even the time for a meal. However, what puzzled the Goryeo army was that they originally thought that Clam Li should be almost in ruins, and the confrontation between the Silk Country and them should be no different from the field battle, but now they saw a new city wall!
Gao Dingbian is certainly not a god, and it is impossible to re-establish the city defense of Clam in an instant. But he did invest a lot of money. Gao Dingbian concentrated all the resources at his disposal to accomplish this feat, and he added shields, planks, and materials to all the vehicles he transported. Cowhides and almost all other materials that could be found were used as cover, and at the same time as the capture of Clam Li, these thousand and forty-two vehicles of various colors were brought to Clam to form a ring wall. Although the wall is only half a man high. But it provided the necessary cover for the soldiers. When the Goryeo army rushed forward, they were greeted by the raining arrows of the Liaodong army and the fire guns of the Shenji battalion!
With a loud roar. The Goryeo army fell in pieces. However, despite the fierce attack of casualties, the Goryeo army trampled on the corpses of their comrades. Step by step, he approached the temporary city walls of the Silk Country.
At this time, a knight jumped out of the city wall and shouted loudly in Goryeo: "I am the Red Tiger King Hanxin!" If you want to die, come up! ”
With Wang Hanxin's attack, hundreds of cavalry from the Tiger Guard Battalion poured out together, following Wang Hanxin to launch a counterattack against the Goryeo army. Wang Hanxin's purpose was very clear, that is, to disrupt the offensive momentum of the Goryeo army and buy time for the archers and the firecrackers of the Shenji battalion. As a result of his hard work, the Goryeo Army's three successive attacks ended in failure. During this period, the Goryeo army suffered more than 2,000 casualties, but the Goryeo army still surrounded it like a tide, and the two sides fell into a stalemate for a while.
However, Li Meng and the Goryeo army made a mistake, because there were as many as 8,000 Liaodong troops attacking Xianli, and they launched a counterattack shortly after the fall of Xianli, so they instinctively deduced that the number of enemy troops in Xianli was 8,000. But they were wrong, at the beginning of the attack was indeed 8,000 troops, but near the end of the battle, Wang Hanxin had quietly withdrawn nearly 2,000 people, plus casualties, so the actual number of people stationed in Clam was only a little more than 3,000. As a result, more than 2,000 soldiers were freed up in the country of silk, and only 3,000 actually used 3,000 to contain 10,000 of the Goryeo army, which created a local military advantage in other parts of the Qingshan battlefield.
Lu Xuan ordered that it was strictly forbidden to be provoked and lured by the other party to leave the existing formation to attack, and Li Meng and the other generals all complied with this order. However, Wang Hanxin dug a trap in the Goryeo formation, attracted the forces of the Goryeo army, and won an opportunity for Gaodingbian to seek a breakthrough in other regions.
After a long time of attacking Clam, Li Meng was faced with a major choice, whether to continue to increase his forces to attack, or to withdraw his troops? At this time, the rest of the region was already strained due to the lack of reserve troops, and if the attack could not be completed on the same day, and then the troops could be brought back, the whole situation of the war could be in crisis.
So Li Meng made the last wrong decision in his life - he personally went to Clam to lead the troops to supervise the battle.
Gao Dingbian had already prepared his troops and was waiting for reinforcements from the Goryeo Army to Xianli. Of course, he didn't expect to catch a general of Li Meng's level, but when it was reported from the front that the commander of the Goryeo reinforcements might be Li Meng, the commander of Qingshan, Gao Dingbian galloped all the way to the outside of the camp tent and flew on his horse, picked up his spear and went straight to the battlefield, without even bringing a guard. Because he recognized that this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
When Li Meng was intercepted and killed by the Liaodong army, he still had a chance to retreat the same way, but because the scale of the opponent was not large, Li Meng thought that this was an encounter and decided to defeat this enemy army. By the time Gao Dingbian arrived at the battlefield, he had lost this opportunity forever.
Li Meng, as Li Chenghui's only surviving son, would not have let him take up his current position if it weren't for the death of a large number of high-ranking generals in Goryeo. However, although he lacked command experience, he was quite a true legend of Li Chenghui in terms of martial arts. It's a pity that he is facing Gao Dingbian, the strongest general in the Liaodong Army, and now there is no one who can win Gao Dingbian in the entire Goryeo Army, even Lu Xuan can't do it, let alone him? Although the anger that rises in the face of his father's killer helps his momentum, it does not make him more calm to deal with this man that even his father cannot defeat. After only fifteen rounds of fighting, Li Meng's chest was pierced by Gao Dingbian's spear, and the Goryeo army, which had lost its commander, retreated all the way.
Gao Dingbian did not pursue this Goryeo army, he took advantage of the fact that the other side lost its commander, commanded the troops to attack from multiple points, and took advantage of the short command confusion of the Goryeo army to successfully cut off the connection between the various departments, and in just two days, the Goryeo army in the Qingshan area was divided into several pieces that could not support each other. Although the Goryeo army was still fighting to the death, the overall situation was completely one-sided.
Due to Qingshan's defeat, Lu Xuan is facing an unprecedented crisis, should he immediately send troops to rescue? If troops are sent to the rescue, how will the frontal battlefield be maintained? This becomes a difficult question to answer. As the saying goes, disaster never goes alone, and at this time he received another report, which made the situation even worse. (To be continued......)