The battle for the raid on the front camp of the thieves was completely over, not counting the captured thieves soldiers, the number of beheadings in this battle alone was the largest and bloodiest battle among the raids.

At this time, the officers and men of the battalions of the New Army and the garrison army were nervously cleaning up the battlefield, and the approximate number of beheadings had been counted.

In this battle, Liu Yan's troops beheaded more than 118,600 people and captured more than 13,600 people. According to the intelligence collected by the Military Intelligence Department and various departments at night, the strength of Li Laiheng's troops in the former battalion of the thieves was about 200,000, and about 130,000 troops of his troops were annihilated in this battle.

And after cleaning the battlefield, many of the heads captured are the thieves among the horsemen and armor, this battle captured tens of thousands of armor, more than 13,000 horses, it can be said that the front camp of the thieves has been abolished!

On the battlefield, the bodies of Xie Junyou, the general of Zuo Guoyi, and Tian Hu, the general of the right Guoyi, were also found in the former camp of the thieves, but no trace of the general Li Laiheng and the general Gu Kecheng of Zuo Guoyi was found, and it is estimated that the two escaped by taking advantage of the chaos.

On the other hand, on the side of the new army and the garrison army, although this battle can be regarded as overwhelming, because the soldiers and horses of the former battalion of the thieves did not surrender for a long time, and the battle was quite fierce in the end, the casualties of the officers and men of each battalion were also greater than the previous three raids.

According to statistics, 1,879 men were killed and 2,460 wounded in the battles of the battalions of the New Army and the garrison troops.

So far, the officers and men of Liu Yan's battalions have experienced long-distance raids and four large-scale raids, including the wounded, and have lost more than 5,400 troops, and the physical strength of the officers and men of all units has also reached the limit, after all, the new army and the garrison army are large

Some of the officers and men were infantry, and in just a few days of time, they rushed to the south and north, during which they engaged in four high-intensity raids, even if they were as strong as the officers and men of the new army and the garrison, they were a little unbearable.

So while the soldiers of each department were still cleaning up the battlefield, Liu Yan summoned the commanders of each department and announced the order to prepare to transfer to Dingzhou.

Everyone had no opinion, but Xu Ming asked, "Pavilion Elder, there are more than 13,600 captives, what about these people?" ”

As he spoke, Xu Ming made a gesture of cutting off his head with his hand.

Miao Shao was eager to try it when he saw this, obviously quite agreeing, although Chen Xun couldn't bear it, but he didn't say anything, after all, the army still has to go to Dingzhou quickly, and during the period, it is indeed not a wise move to hide the traces of the army, with 10,000 thousands of prisoners.

The rest of the group were also silent.

Liu Yan sighed, most of those captives were horsemen and armor soldiers from the former camp of the thieves, and some of them were firecrackers, and there were very few dead soldiers, because the rogue soldiers who could survive to the end of the war could only be elites, and those dead soldiers had either run away a long time ago, or had already died on the chaotic battlefield.

So Liu Yan said in a deep voice: "Move quickly, the army will set off in an hour." ”

Xu Ming and Miao Shao hugged their fists and took the order and set off directly with people.

It didn't take long for the screams to come from on the south bank of the Shahe River, and Liu Yan sighed slightly when he heard it, this is the price!

Those thieves and soldiers followed Li Zicheng to attack the city and pull out the village, coerce the people, and do a lot of things to kill people and seize wealth and rape women on weekdays

Li Zicheng is in trouble, so he has to bear the fate of being in a different place now.

And Liu Yan also has to pay the price, that is, psychological pressure, after all, from ancient times to the present, killing prisoners has been regarded as an ominous thing, even if it is forced by the situation!

Less than an hour later, the battalions of the new army and the garrison were assembled, a large number of heads and captured booty were loaded onto the wagons accompanying the army, and some of the supplies were distributed among the more than 10,000 captured horses.

"Let's go, go to Dingzhou!"

The army crossed the river from the bridge on the battlefield, and then went east along the Shahe River, heading straight for Dingzhou.

Two days later, the officers and men of the new army and the garrison army arrived in the west of Dingzhou.

Dingzhou is an important town in North Zhili, the geographical location is very important, since ancient times there is "the throat of Kyushu, the main area of Shenjing" said.

In the third year of Tianxing in the Northern Wei Dynasty, that is, when the park was 400 years old, Tuoba Jue changed Anzhou to Dingzhou, and the name Dingzhou began to appear.

In the ninth year of Hongwu in the Ming Dynasty, the imperial court re-demarcated the Dingzhou area, and the state was governed by Dingzhou City, which governed four counties, namely Dingzhou, Xinle, Quyang, and Xingtang.

It can be said that during this period of time, Liu Yan led his troops to fight several raids, all of which were fought in Dingzhou, perhaps later generations will collectively refer to this series of battles as the Battle of Dingzhou, Liu Yan led his troops to look at Dingzhou City in the distance, which has shown its outline, and thought so in his heart.

Although Liu Yan has not been to Dingzhou City, in his previous life, Liu Yan had also visited many places in Hebei and heard a lot about Dingzhou.

There is a "landmark building" in Dingzhou City, that is, the Kaiyuan Temple Tower, also known as the enemy tower, because the tower is built in the Kaiyuan Temple, so it is commonly known as "

Kaiyuan Temple Tower".

This high tower is located in the Kaiyuan Temple on the east side of the south city gate of Dingzhou, it is the Northern Song Dynasty Xianping four years, Song Zhenzong in order to worship the Buddhist scriptures and relics that the monks of the Kaiyuan Temple can get back from ancient India and the edict to build the temple to build the tower, the Northern Song Dynasty was completed in two years, which lasted 55 years.

Because Dingzhou is a military important place close to the Liao and Song Dynasty, the Song Dynasty used this tower to look at the enemy situation in order to defend the Khitan, so it was called "the enemy tower" (or "the enemy tower"). Dingxian Kaiyuan Temple tower body eleven levels, about 84 meters high, is an octagonal pavilion type building, can be said to be the highest brick tower at this time, has the reputation of "China's first tower".

At this time, the new army and the garrison army had arrived outside the city of Dingzhou, and the brigade of the vanguard had entered the city from the west gate at night, and the governor of Dingzhou and a number of officials in the city were also at the gate of the city to greet Liu Yan at this time.

Liu Yance greeted everyone for a while, and said that now is wartime, everyone does not have to accompany him, just handle the affairs of the city, as for the war, everyone does not need to care.

Na Zhizhou and the others suddenly breathed a sigh of relief.

Liu Yan raised his head and looked into the city, and saw the enemy tower in the city at a glance, so he secretly said in his heart: "You can arrange people to be on the tower and observe the surrounding enemy situation with a clairmile mirror, which is also a good city defense facility!" ”

Liu Yan also knew that there was a Great Avenue View Jade Emperor Hall in Dingzhou City, which was built in the Yuan Dynasty and had the characteristics of typical Yuan Dynasty buildings with reduced columns. There is still a complete large-scale "worship map of the gods" mural in the Wanli period in the hall, the layout is sparse and dense, and the painted characters are smooth.

It is said that this "pilgrimage of the gods" is so spectacular that many ministers of the court have come to see it

, and left a "Mobao" in the hall.

In addition, there is Dingzhou Confucian Temple in the city, also known as "Confucius Temple", just on the sword and gun street in the city, it was built in the second year of the Tang Dynasty, and later the Song, Yuan, and Ming dynasties have repaired. Now it should be used as a government school, a state school or a school palace, known as "Zhongshan Temple to learn the world" reputation.

Dingzhou Confucian Temple is the largest and most complete architectural structure preservation of a Confucian temple complex in Beizhili. The three adjacent courtyards in the east, west and center have been preserved, and the building layout is central axis.

The main buildings of the East Courtyard are the Chongsheng Shrine and the Kuixing Pavilion; The west courtyard is Minglun Hall; The middle courtyard is the Dacheng Palace, the Halberd Gate, and the Lingxing Gate. At the same time, there are also famous places such as Dongpo Shuanghuai, Huai Baochun, and Luoxing Stone.

At this time, the governor of Dingzhou said: "The elder suddenly led the army here, and the lower officials did not have time to prepare a place for the elder to settle down, and asked the elder to move to the Zhizhou Yamen to rest for a while." ”

Liu Yan thought of the Confucian Temple in the city at this time, so he said: "Zhizhou Yamen will not go, send someone to clean up the Confucian Temple, and the Confucian Temple will settle down in the Confucian Temple, and the Confucian Temple will temporarily serve as the Chinese army of the Prince." ”

Zhizhou was stunned for a moment, and then took the order and hurriedly took people to prepare.

Miao Shao said with a smile: "A good place chosen by the elder of the pavilion, I heard that the scenery of the Dingzhou Confucian Temple is good." ”

Liu Yan smiled and said, "The Temple of Literature is relatively close to the enemy tower in the city, so it is convenient to report. ”

Just when Liu Yan led his troops to Dingzhou City, Gu Kecheng and Li Laiheng fled back to Xingtang County one after another, and after the two met in the city, they were very depressed.

At this time, there were only more than 1,000 horsemen, more than 2,000 armor soldiers left around Li Laiheng, and thousands of dead soldiers who followed all the way.

And Gu Kecheng

There were more than 6,000 horsemen, more than 2,000 armor soldiers, and hundreds of firecrackers.

This is all the remaining strength of the former camp of the thieves, compared with the previous 210,000 troops, at this time Li Laiheng and Gu Kecheng only had about 20,000 defeated soldiers, and Xie Junyou and Tian Hu were nowhere to be found, and it is estimated that they were either captured by Liu Yan or had died in the chaos.

Under such big ups and downs, Rao is Li Laiheng and Gu Kecheng's hearts are like iron, and they are also crying at this time.

Suddenly, the war drums in the city sounded, Li Laiheng and Gu Kecheng were shocked, and hurriedly commanded the remnants of the city to defend the city, and the two came to the west city wall of the warning together, only to see that there were boundless armies all over the city outside the city, and several poles were fluttering in the wind in the military array, the middle one was a bright yellow Da Xu, the left one was a cyan Da Xu, and the right one was a white Da Xu.

Behind these three poles, there are two green poles, a total of five poles, that is, the old camp of thieves, the middle battalion, the left battalion, and the two new military battalions led by Wu Sangui and Chen Yongfu.

Here are all the troops of the thieves at this time, five battalions, more than 570,000 soldiers and horses!

Li Laiheng and Gu Kecheng saw the arrival of the main army, and their hearts suddenly had mixed feelings, and they all stood on the head of the city and cried and shouted, and the surrounding front camp was also like crazy, waving their hands at the hundreds of thousands of troops outside the city, shouting hoarsely.

Hundreds of thousands of thieves immediately stationed in Xingtang County, Li Zicheng led Liu Fangliang, Liu Zongmin, Wu Sangui, Chen Yongfu, as well as Hong Chengchou, Li Yan, Gu Junen, Niu Jinxing, Song Xiance and others to the county government in the city, Li Laiheng, Gu Kecheng knelt in the lobby, waiting

Li Zicheng's fall.

At this time, after listening to Li Laiheng's account, and at the same time, combined with the reports of the scouts of each battalion and the routs of each department, he had basically figured out what happened during this time.

For Liu Yan to lead his troops to fight in various places, successively annihilating the front battalion, rear battalion, right battalion and firearms battalion, the anger in Li Zicheng's heart is beyond measure, especially Li Guo's death, which made Li Zicheng almost carried away by anger, if it was not blocked by Li Yan, Hong Chengchou and others, it is estimated that Xingtang County would not enter, and directly searched all the way forward, and began to restart the previous mode of shoveling the city and coercing the people!

"Get up, the fiasco of the front camp is not the responsibility of the two of you!"

After the anger, Li Zicheng finally suppressed the anger in his heart, and then said to Li Laiheng and Gu Kecheng: "Next, the two of you will lead your troops to be stationed in Xingtang County, collect the defeated troops from all over here, recruit people from the surrounding areas, and rebuild the front camp as soon as possible." At the same time, they are waiting here for the women and children of the old camp to arrive. ”

Li Laiheng and Gu Kecheng immediately received the order.

At this time, Hong Chengchou stood up, knelt directly on the ground, and said: "If your subordinates make a mistake in formulating a strategy, please punish Your Majesty!" ”

A trace of killing intent flashed in Li Zicheng's eyes in an instant, but then it vanished, replaced by a sense of powerlessness.

"Mr. Hong, get up, Gu has already said that there is no problem with the strategy, but Liu Yan is too cunning and treacherous, and he actually used infantry to fight such a mobile rushing battle, which is beyond everyone's imagination!"