knife

Chapter 818 The first battle is the decisive battle

What tears through the thickest curtain of night before dawn is not the first ray of light in the sky, but the long, desolate sound of a bugle.
When the hundreds of long horn blasts sounded from Chang Lei's camp, a telepathic response immediately came from the direction of Anfu Temple in the distance.

The war drums thundered, and the long palisade collapsed to the ground from the inside out almost simultaneously. The soldiers pushed down the palisade themselves, demonstrating their determination to fight to the death.

The fallen fence kicked up a cloud of dust, from which countless warhorses surged forth, neighing, and galloped wildly toward Anfu Temple.

The two camps were only a few miles apart, and the cavalry could arrive in the blink of an eye with a charge.

Leading the charge were several thousand allied cavalrymen led by Kou Wenhai.

Compared to Chang Lei's main force, these cavalrymen were naturally far inferior in terms of organization, discipline, and tactical skills. However, as a powerful weapon among the private armies that various wealthy families had been cultivating, their individual combat strength was not bad. Placing them in the first wave of attacks was naturally intended to wear down the enemy's cavalry numbers.

Chang Lei believed that he still had the upper hand over the opposing side in terms of the quantity and quality of his cavalry.

Kou Wenhai was at the forefront.

He knew very well that he was not fighting for Chang Lei, but for the life and death of his family. Therefore, he held nothing back, and the Kou family's strongest members were all in the front row.

Other powerful families and clans have no irreconcilable grudges with Li Dachui and Jiang Qian, but if you step into this meat grinder and raise your swords and spears, and still have these miscellaneous thoughts in your mind, then you are truly courting death.

All negotiations, compromises, and deals take place either before or after the war, but never during wartime, and certainly not at this moment when the two sides are about to clash.

Only by surviving can one have the right to talk about what comes next, and if one wins, that would naturally be the best outcome.

So, let's give it our all first!

As Kou Wenhai charged out of the camp, the Chu army from the direction of Anfu Temple also pushed down the fence in front of them at the same time. However, what came out from behind the fence were not cavalry, but rows of infantry.

These are the heavy infantry that the Chu army relied on for survival.

Besides its navy, another key to Chu's ability to hold out against Qin for centuries was its heavily armored infantry. Using infantry to control cavalry was Chu's specialty. These soldiers, fully armored and with the first three ranks wielding spears over ten feet long, marched heavily to their designated spots, raised their arms, and thrust their spears, creating a forest of gleaming spears on the flat ground.

Behind them were still heavily armored soldiers, but these soldiers no longer carried spears. Each of them held a four-sided mace, a heavy weapon weighing more than ten kilograms. Whether it was a man or a horse, being hit by this thing would immediately lose most of its fighting ability, even if it didn't kill them.

Behind these men were crossbowmen. They sat on the ground, with a quiver of twenty arrows in front of them. When it was time to draw the bowstring, they lay on their backs and used their feet to draw it. The arrowheads of these crossbows were specifically designed to penetrate armor.

This was the Tiger Warriors of the Chu Kingdom. Behind the infantry were the cavalry.

The earth began to tremble, the drumbeats grew more intense, and in the blink of an eye, the field of vision was filled with charging cavalry, and nothing else could be seen.

"put!"

The officer's hoarse shouts rang out, followed by a muffled thud. A cloud of crossbow bolts leaped into the air, covering the path of the charge. The cavalrymen would desperately brandish their weapons and accelerate their horses to their maximum speed. Under this barrage of fire, they could only do their best and leave the rest to fate, while also testing the strength of their armor.

As the arrows fell, several clearings appeared amidst the charging masses that covered the mountains and plains, with some more unclaimed warhorses appearing. However, these clearings were quickly filled by those who came later, and the unclaimed warhorses continued to charge forward due to inertia.

Then, a second wave of firing came.

Kou Wenhai didn't care about the arrows falling from the sky at all.

With his profound energy surging, almost all the arrows that came near him were shaken and fell to the ground in disarray. Behind him, the Kou family disciples were almost lined up in a straight line.

Ahead lay a steel jungle. Kou Wenhai roared, raised his hand, and his eighteen-foot spear spun out. With a muffled thud, the armored soldier at the front was instantly torn to pieces, and the flying blood and flesh covered the others on either side.

Before they could even feel fear, Kou Wenhai had already galloped up to them. With a wave of his hand, the eighteen-foot spear that had been thrown back flew back. Holding the spear in one hand, he swept it horizontally, sending more than a dozen spears flying into the air. The spear thrust out, striking each of the flying spears with perfect accuracy. The returning spears immediately killed more than ten soldiers. Kou Wenhai had created a gap in the forest of spears, and then spurred his horse through the gap.

A mace slammed down, and Kou Wenhai casually struck back. His opponent grunted, surprisingly taking the blow, though blood streamed from his hands, indicating considerable pain. Kou Wenhai glanced at him, too lazy to follow up with a second strike, and continued spurring his horse forward. The Tiger Guard officer who had just parried his spear thrust caught up, aiming his mace at Kou Wenhai's horse's rump. Kou Wenhai countered with a thrust, but several maces appeared mid-strike, blocking the attack. With a thud, the maces flew into the air, but the horse took a solid hit to the rump. The horse neighed in pain, its hind legs buckling, and Kou Wenhai was forced to leap off, abandoning his mount.

Not everyone could be as fierce as Kou Wenhai. Apart from a very few who managed to break through the hail of spears, most were stopped outside the hail of spears or trapped in the armored formation. Especially after the horses' charging speed was reduced, the cavalry's advantage also began to diminish. At this point, they had only managed to break through the first two ranks of heavy infantry, and were still a long way from breaking through the enemy lines.

As Kou Wenhai began his charge, a second wave of horns and drums sounded from Chang Lei's camp. The second wave of cavalry charged out of the camp with shouts; it was five thousand cavalrymen personally led by Chang Lei, and at the very heart of the force were the personal guards of Linghu Ye, brought by Linghu Yong.

They still have eight hundred men.

Now, all eight hundred people are closely following Chang Lei.

In Chang Lei's hands, the power they could unleash was many times greater than in Linghu Yong's hands.

Behind Chang Lei, countless infantrymen formed square formations and slowly advanced forward.

The first battle is the decisive battle.
Chang Lei is going all out; today's battle will decide the outcome.
(End of this chapter)