Yongli Ming Dynasty
Chapter 274 Ambush
Chapter 274 Ambush
Du Qifei led his army to forcibly demand food and grass from Jinning and Kunyang, then headed south into the mountains towards Xinxing Prefecture.
Kunming is located on the bank of Dianchi Lake. Dianchi Lake is surrounded by flat plains. Starting from Kunming, you can go south all the way to Kunyang, which is the end of the flat land of Dianchi Lake. To the south of Kunyang are vast mountains and hills.
On the mountain road, the Kunming army was marching in the mountains. The team of more than 20,000 people stretched for more than ten miles in the mountains, like a winding snake.
Li Dingguo stood on a hillside, with Bai Wenxuan, Wang Shangli, Feng Shuangli and other generals of the West Camp standing behind him.
Li Dingguo was holding a copper telescope in his hand, looking at the troops in the mountains below. The vanguard of the Yi army had already passed the mountain pass, and there were still soldiers coming into the mountains from behind.
Li Dingguo turned the bronze mirror and said softly
"The bandit army is divided into three columns, and the team stretches for more than ten miles. The intelligence sent from Jinning Prefecture should be correct. The number of bandit troops is at least over 10,000, and it looks like there are far more than 10,000. I'm afraid there are more than 20,000 people."
Wang Shangli took a few steps forward, looked at the Kunming rebels marching below, and spoke
"What's going on with the Tengxiang Army? They've been in the mountain pass for a quarter of an hour, why haven't they sent any messages yet?"
"The rebel rear guard is still outside the mountain pass. The Tengxiang Army should want to annihilate this garrison and wait until the rebel army enters the mountain pass before attacking."
Li Dingguo spoke softly, and then put down the telescope in his hand. Wang Shangli took the telescope and looked at it. Sure enough, the rear team of the Yi army was still three or four miles away from the mountain pass and had not completely entered the mountain road.
Wang Shangli used the telescope to look through it. Even though he had used it several times, Wang Shangli still thought it was amazing.
Wang Shangli fiddled with the telescope in his hand and said
"With this telescope, it will be convenient to detect the enemy in the future. The Ming court has so many good things. This telescope is so useful, why did they only send one to me? The Ming court is really stingy."
Li Dingguo looked at the rebels marching below and replied casually:
"This telescope is not easy to make. There are only seven or eight in the Tengxiang Army. We only sent one to ambush the rebels this time."
"This thing is quite delicate. I heard it was made by a master craftsman in the palace. If it is damaged, it can only be repaired in the court."
Wang Shangli ignored what Li Dingguo said and continued to look through the telescope. Wang Shangli looked up the mountain path and suddenly exclaimed:
"This is the war elephant that Jin Ningzhou mentioned. There really is such a huge beast in this world."
Bai Wenxuan and Feng Shuangli in the back heard this and stepped forward to take the telescope. When they saw the huge war elephant on the mountain road, they were also amazed.
Feng Shuangli looked at the elephant that was almost as tall as two soldiers and couldn't help but speak.
"If we can get more than a hundred of these giant beasts, form a cavalry with them, and then put them in armor, who can stop us in battle?"
Li Dingguo looked at the giant beast in the mountains in the distance and said
"During the last military meeting, I heard from Mr. Lei that this war elephant is unique to Yunnan Province. Such a giant beast is basically not found in the Central Plains."
"Using war elephants to charge into battle has been around since ancient times. I heard that war elephants are extremely rare even in Yunnan Province. It is not easy to capture and raise them. It may not be easy to form an army with them."
"But if we can capture this giant beast this time, we can bring it to the army and let the soldiers in the camp get familiar with it."
"The Kunming rebels have war elephants, so there must be more among the Sha bandits. The war elephants are so huge that the soldiers will surely be frightened if they see them for the first time. It is better to let the soldiers in the army familiarize themselves with them in advance."
Li Dingguo and his men discussed the use of the war elephants, while the rebel soldiers below were still unaware and continued to march into the mountains. The rebel soldiers in the rear were less than a mile away from the mountain pass.
Li Dingguo also stopped everyone at this time and said
"The enemy troops are about to enter the mountain pass. I'm afraid the ambush troops ahead will soon launch an attack. We have traveled thousands of miles and traveled through the mountains for five or six days. This ambush must not go wrong here. Do you understand?"
Feng Shuangli looked at the defenseless Yi army in the mountains below and said
"We ambush this time to prevent our tracks from being leaked, so we deliberately retreated a long distance. We never expected that before this bandit army entered the mountain, they didn't even send scouts to investigate, but marched directly into the mountain."
"This bandit army has entered our ambush area. We have already won this battle. It is just a matter of how many enemies we kill. General, don't worry."
Bai Wenxuan and the others nodded slightly when they heard this. Although the number of the bandit army was nearly twice theirs, the Ming army had already figured out the marching route and the situation in the army.
At this time, they had already entered their ambush area, and this bandit army had almost no chance of turning the tables.
Although Li Dingguo spoke seriously, he knew in his heart that this bandit army was almost certain to be defeated, so he did not say anything more and directly asked Bai Wenxuan to return to their respective units to prepare to ambush the enemy.
After the Ming army captured Qujing, they rested in the city for three days. After preparing food and supplies, they set out again and marched towards Lin'an Prefecture.
The Ming army marched southwards, and the prefectures and counties along the way, such as Yuezhou and Luliangzhou, opened their cities and surrendered when they saw the Ming army approaching. The Ming army encountered no resistance along the way and arrived directly at the city of Lunanzhou.
The Ming army arrived in Lunan Prefecture and finally began to pause. The reason why the Ming army stopped here was not because they encountered resistance, but because the spies that the Ming army had previously spread into Yunnan Province finally brought back the Xinxing Prefecture gentry Lei Yuelong and others.
The Ming army that entered Yunnan had only more than 10,000 people. If the Ming court wanted to defeat the rebels and restore its rule over Yunnan as soon as possible, it had to rely on the local chieftains and gentry in Yunnan.
Before Zhang Huangyan, Gong Yi and others entered Yunnan, they had compiled a list of Yunnan scholars from the Ministry of Personnel.
After Gong Yi and his men occupied Qujing, they immediately sent spies to various prefectures to contact the scholars and old officials of Yunnan Province.
Among these Yunnan gentry, Lei Yuelong was the most prominent one. Lei Yuelong was from Xinxingzhou, Yunnan Province. He was a Jinshi in the Tianqi period and had served as the Left Vice Minister of the Ministry of Rites during the Chongzhen period. It can be said that if Li Zicheng had not invaded the capital, he would almost certainly have been one of the Nine Ministers, and it was not impossible for him to enter the cabinet.
After Li Zicheng invaded the capital, Lei Yuelong survived torture and escaped from the capital to his hometown. Gong Yi searched for him in all quarters of the court and found out his whereabouts. As soon as he entered Yunnan, he sent someone to contact him.
Officials like Lei Yuelong are in a relationship of mutual benefit and loss with the Ming court. As long as there is a glimmer of hope, it is almost impossible for such high-ranking officials of the Ming court to betray the Ming court.
After Lei Yuelong received the letter from the court in Xinxing Prefecture, he did not hesitate at all and immediately responded to the imperial edict to meet with the Ming army. Ma Bao and others waited for Lei Yuelong in Lunan Prefecture. After informing him of the plan to ambush the rebels in Kunming, Ma Bao and others officially divided their troops in Lunan Prefecture.
The Ming army split into two groups in Lunan Prefecture. One group was led by Gao Wengui and Yang Wu, who led 3,000 soldiers from the Loyalty Camp to continue southward to Mile Prefecture. At the same time, they recruited a large number of civilians to pretend to be Ming troops, and continued to march towards Lin'an Prefecture with great fanfare along the way.
The other group of more than 10,000 people, led by Ma Bao and others, marched eastward rapidly. The main force of the Ming army went eastward to recruit the surrender of Chengjiang. After replenishing food and money in Chengjiang, they continued to march quickly, and went south along the west bank of Fuxian Lake all the way to Jiangchuan.
With the help of Lie Yuelong and other Yunnan scholars, Chengjiang, Jiangchuan and other places did not put up any resistance and surrendered directly to the Ming army.
After Ma Bao and his men got supplies in Jiangchuan, they, under the leadership of Lei Yuelong and his men, plunged into the vast mountains to the west. These mountains were the only way from Jinning to Xinxingzhou.
The Ming army marched through the mountains and finally arrived near the post road before the Kunming rebels. After some exploration, the Ming army quickly selected a place for ambush.
The Ming army set up an ambush at Huangcaoling with 4,000 men from the Loyalty Camp led by Li Dingguo, and 2,000 Gui troops led by Xu Gao. The third ambush was set at Qinglong Mountain with 3,000 Tengxiang troops led by Ma Bao.
The mountain road is narrow, and the most important part of this ambush is the head and tail. As long as the head and tail are blocked, the rebels will be trapped in the mountains. Even if the Ming army does not attack, the rebels will be defeated.
On the mountain road, the Yi army had already completely entered the mountains. The soldiers in the front were almost crossing Qinglong Mountain. The border of Xinxing Prefecture and County was ahead.
The front barbarian army was about to leave the mountain pass when suddenly a cannon shot was heard in the mountains.
Rumble
There was a loud sound of artillery fire on the top of the mountain, and the rumbling sound of artillery kept echoing in the mountains, like thunder.
On the mountain road, the marching team suddenly stopped. The soldiers in the team heard the rumbling of artillery fire all around them, and looked around with fear on their faces. Some soldiers suddenly knelt on the ground, thinking that the mountain god was angry, and knelt down and kowtowed to the mountain and the sky.
"Who is firing the cannon and where is the sound coming from?"
On the mountain road, the Yi army commander Du Qifei heard the sound of the cannon and his expression suddenly changed. Although Du Qifei was also a Yi general from Tuzhou, he was a high-ranking general in the army after all. Those local soldiers recruited from the Yi village had never seen a gun or cannon, but Du Qifei knew about firearms such as the tiger squat cannon.
Du Qifei knew that this was not the anger of the mountain god or the thunder god, but someone was using artillery, and the one who could use artillery here at this time must be the enemy.
Du Qifei called his personal guards and ordered them to organize the troops and explore the position of the enemy artillery. But before he could start making arrangements, he saw hundreds of cavalrymen suddenly rushing towards the front of the battle on the official road ahead.
In front of the Yi army, hundreds of Ming soldiers wearing cloth-covered iron armor rushed down a hillside and headed straight for the army formation. Before the hundreds of cavalrymen approached, a wave of arrows had already covered them, and the Yi army in the front formation fell down immediately.
The cavalry was covered with two rounds of arrow rain, and the Yi army in the front began to collapse. Then hundreds of armored cavalrymen drew their sabers, and then rode their horses directly into the front formation without dodging or avoiding. The sabers slashed down one after another, and the Yi soldiers in the front formation finally collapsed completely, and fled madly to the mountains on both sides.
The cavalry charged into the battle formation, and at this time, continuous trumpet sounds rang out from the mountains on both sides. Countless Ming soldiers suddenly appeared from the mountains on both sides, forming a battle formation and charging towards the Yi soldiers on the mountain road.
These Ming army squads consisted of a dozen or more people, with three or four sword and shield soldiers in the front, spearmen holding long spears in the back and on both sides, and archers with long swords on their waists in the back.
The Ming army approached the mountain road, with the sword and shield soldiers in front and the spearmen protecting the two wings. At the same time, they kept stabbing and killing the Yi soldiers in front and kept advancing.
The Yi soldiers on the mountain road had already been in chaos. Facing these Ming troops who were marching in formation, the Yi soldiers had no power to resist at all.
Even if some brave barbarian soldiers tried to resist, they were either stabbed to death by spears or shot to death by archers in the rear before they could get close to the army.
Under the stranglehold of the Ming army, the Yi army in the front completely collapsed, and everyone fled madly to the rear.
While the Ming army was strangling the Yi soldiers, the cannon fire in the mountains never stopped. The thunderous sound of the cannons kept echoing in the mountains, which made the Yi soldiers on the mountain roads even more panicked.
In fact, the artillery of the Ming army could not reach the Yi army on the mountain road. In order to prevent the disclosure of their tracks, the Ming army deliberately placed their ambush far away. Moreover, the Ming army was marching from the mountains and did not bring many artillery with them.
At this time, the Ming army kept firing artillery to disrupt the morale of the Yi army. The Ming army ambushed and attacked, and the surrounding mountains were filled with the rumbling sound of artillery. As long as the Yi soldiers on the mountain road were panicked, they would no longer have the power to resist.
The Ming army fired artillery to disrupt the Yi army and also to send a signal for attack.
At this time, artillery fire roared in front of them. Xu Gao, who was in the mountain road, heard the sound of artillery fire and immediately led his men out of the mountain to attack the middle section of the Yi army.
When Xu Gao led the Gui army to charge, the sound of artillery fire was also heard on the hilltop in the middle section, and the sound of artillery fire soon spread to Huangcaoling in the rear.
When the people of the Loyalty Camp at Huangcaoling heard the sound of artillery fire from the mountains in the distance, they knew that the front had already started fighting, so they immediately rushed out from the rear and attacked the rear of the Yi army.
Liu Wenxiu led Bai Wenxuan, Feng Shuangli, and Wang Shangli to charge out from the mountains. The troops from the Loyalty Camp attacked together, and the rear of the Yi army soon became chaotic.
The three Ming armies attacked at the same time. The mountain road was full of soldiers from both armies fighting frantically. However, more foreign soldiers had already begun to flee to the mountains on both sides with terrified expressions.
Li Dingguo stood on the hillside, watching the soldiers fighting in the mountains, his face calm, and behind him were 300 cavalry guards standing quietly waiting.
At this time, the Yi army in the rear of the mountain road had already shown signs of defeat. The Yi army was driven by Liu Wenxiu and others and continued to flee forward.
Wang Shangli suddenly rushed out of the mountain road and headed towards the hillside. Before his horse had even stopped, he jumped off the horse and walked towards Li Dingguo with a bleeding head in his hand.
Wang Shangli's armor was stained dark red by blood. He held the head in front of Li Dingguo and said
"General, I have asked someone to verify this man, and it is the leader of the Yi army, Du Qifei. I have already beheaded him."
Li Dingguo looked at the terrified head in Wang Shangli's hand, his face calm, and he spoke directly
"Hang up this man's head and force these bandits to surrender as soon as possible."
"I will obey your order"
Wang Shangli held up his head and braid, but a grim smile appeared on his face, and he said
"I want to see who dares to look down on us Western Army in the future."
Wang Shangli took a spear from his side and directly inserted the head on the tip of the spear. Then Wang Shangli jumped on his horse, holding the spear and the head, and rushed into the mountains. Several guards closely guarded Wang Shangli on both sides, holding Du Qifei's flag in their hands.
Wang Shangli ran into the mountain road with his head held high, shouting
"The thief is already dead, kneeling on the ground and not killed"
The guards behind Wang Shangli also kept shouting
"The thief is already dead, kneeling on the ground and not killed"
When the soldiers on the mountain road saw Wang Shangli's raised head and the blood-stained flag, they immediately became chaotic. Some soldiers dropped their swords and knelt on the side of the road, while more soldiers fled into the mountains.
With the death of Du Qifei, the Yi army in the mountains finally collapsed.
Half an hour later, the sounds of fighting in the mountains finally began to subside. At this time, the mountain road was already full of corpses. Teams of Ming soldiers were searching for the remaining injured Yi soldiers and beheading them one by one.
In this battle, the Ming army killed 7,000 to 8,000 Yi soldiers and captured more than 3,000. The remaining Yi soldiers all fled into the mountains and disappeared.
Although the Ming army won a great victory, they did not stay here for long. Ma Bao discussed with Li Dingguo and other commanders of each camp and decided to leave 1,000 soldiers to clean up the battlefield and escort the surrendered soldiers to Xinxingzhou.
Ma Bao and his men led the main force of the Ming army and marched northwards towards Kunming.
(End of this chapter)
You'll Also Like
-
Becoming Stronger After Death: I Keep Seeking Death in the World of the Universe.
Chapter 333 21 hours ago -
Who brought this guy into the monastic circle?.
Chapter 586 21 hours ago -
What the hell is making games in the Ninja World?.
Chapter 331 21 hours ago -
I was caught pretending to be a Taoist priest and asked me how to kill a strange person?
Chapter 139 21 hours ago -
Douluo: Qianxunji's Secret Life
Chapter 135 21 hours ago -
Travel through the heavens together, with top talents
Chapter 248 21 hours ago -
In Douluo, Wuhun holds the Tianping
Chapter 322 21 hours ago -
Versatile Mage: Soul and Demon Dual Cultivation.
Chapter 376 21 hours ago -
Establishing the Immortal Clan from Simulation.
Chapter 165 21 hours ago -
Hong Kong General: Undercover and Liansheng, from 49 to leader
Chapter 362 21 hours ago