All Heavens and Worlds Modified History System

Chapter 308: Defeat Shatuo, Li Ke escapes at night
In Yunzhong, north of Dai, there is the main camp of the Shatuo army.

Li Keyong, who had been officially appointed as the governor of Hedong by the court, was losing his temper.

"Defend the city, defend the city. We are all cavalry. Defending the city means defending ourselves to death!"

All the generals looked embarrassed, but no one dared to speak.

Although Li Keyong was young, he was vigorous and capable, and he enjoyed great prestige among the three Shatuo tribes.

He asked again, "What do the Qibi and Helian tribes say?"

General Kang Junli immediately stepped out and saluted, "Jiedu, Qibi and Helian both refused to send troops to help, saying that they would not help each other."

"madness!"

Li Keyong's eyes widened with anger. "That Chen Ran is extremely murderous, how could he let them go? If they don't come to our aid now, we will surely defeat them one by one in the future!"

All the generals were speechless. It's no use for you to tell us these.

After venting his anger, Li Keyong took a breath and asked, "Have all the troops been mobilized?"

"Return to the governor, all those who can ride horses and hold swords have been assembled."

Li Keyong asked again, "Is there any news from father?"

"There is no news from Tatar."

The so-called Shatuo people were originally a tribe under the Western Turkic Khanate, named after the desert north of the Ling Mountains.

They were originally a tribe from the Western Regions, migrating all the way to this northern land. They did not have much friendship with the various tribes on the grassland here.

At this time, Chen Ran sent a large army to attack the Shatuo people. The various tribes on the grassland chose to protect themselves. No one was willing to live and die with the Shatuo people.

For example, the Qibi tribe of the Tiele people and the Helian tribe of the Xianbei people were large tribes that could mobilize tens of thousands of cavalry, but no one was willing to help.

In desperation, Li Keyong's father Li Guochang had to run to the Tatars in the farther north to seek reinforcements.

"How many troops have you recruited now?" Although he was anxious, Li Keyong did not show it in front of others. At such a young age, he was able to keep his emotions under control. "How many 50,000?"

"Jiedu." Li Jinzhong, the military commander, stepped out and responded, "The three Shatuo tribes plus the recruited foreign soldiers, there are about 40,000."

This is different from Li Keyong's father in history, who rebelled against the court and was besieged on all sides, and eventually was defeated and fled.

At this time, they had gained recognition from the imperial court, and the three Shatuo tribes had also made great efforts to give them face.

"Okay."

Li Keyong slammed the table and stood up, "Forty thousand men, we can fight."

When the generals went out to reorganize the troops and prepare for battle, Li Keyong showed a difficult expression, "It would be great if we could occupy Hedong."

He was the governor of Hedong, but he could only look at the territory of Hedong but could not touch it.

"It's all the fault of the imperial court. If they had given Hedong to me earlier, Chen Ran would not have been my opponent!"

He was a rebel before. Would the imperial court give Hedong Town, one of the three great towns in the world, to a rebel?
But this is true. Hedong Town has a population of millions, 70,000 to 80,000 soldiers, a large amount of food and supplies, and rich products.

In particular, its favorable terrain is enough to pose a huge threat to Chen Ran.

In history, Li Keyong even relied on the power of a town to resist Zhu Wen for many years.

His sons even used this power to destroy the Liang State of the Zhu family.

Unfortunately, Chen Ran knew all this early on, so he took away Hedong Town in advance, directly cutting off the foundation for Li Keyong's rise.

"Jiedu." Li Jinzhong, the only remaining military commander, asked in confusion, "Why do we have to fight in the wild? Youzhou has strong troops and horses, and our chances of winning are slim."

This is an understatement. Not only is the chance of winning slim, in fact, there is almost no chance of winning.

"You are one of us, and I can tell you something." Li Keyong sighed, "We are not those tribes on the grasslands that can drive ox carts around. Our roots are in Daibei, in Datong."

"You also know the situation in the city. Supplies are scarce, and the food and grass are only enough for two or three months at most. If they besiege the city, they won't even have to fight, they will be able to trap us to death."

The Shatuo people were no longer a nomadic tribe, they were a settled people.

Now that they have a city, they also have a vital point that cannot be moved.

After years of rebellion, all available forces had long been used up, and defending the city meant defending death.

Li Jinzhong nodded in agreement, bowed, and left to reorganize his troops.

Li Keyong had another thought that he didn't say out loud, which was, "If it really doesn't work, we can just flee far away on horseback."

He was not a stubborn person who could not tolerate failure. Running away after being defeated was not stressful at all for him.

The wild waves were defeated, making it easy to escape.

The defenders were trapped inside the city, with nowhere to escape.

Of course, with a war on the horizon, this little thought cannot be told to anyone.

A few days later, the two armies collided on the vast grassland north of Yunzhong and south of Yinshan Mountain.

The Shatuo people were excellent at cavalry and archery, and there was no place they needed to be rescued, so it was naturally impossible for them to take the initiative to collide with Chen Ran's silver spear.

The real main force in the decisive battle was the cavalry that attacked Shandu.

"I've heard for a long time that Shatuo cavalry is very powerful."

Chen Ran, sitting on horseback, looked at the Shatuo cavalrymen moving back and forth in the distance. "They are really good."

This is real horse archery. The horsemanship is so superb that he can control the horse freely with just his legs.

The bows and arrows were sharp and accurate, and almost everyone shot at the face and other unarmored areas. They gathered and dispersed at random, but they could quickly form queues of different sizes to fight. This ability was really amazing.

Chen Ran made a comparison in his mind. The fighting power of Shatuo cavalry was far superior to that of Tatars. Compared with the most elite Heza Meng'an of Jin people, one was a bow cavalry and the other was an armored cavalry. It was not easy to compare them.

After understanding his opponent, Chen Ran began to make arrangements. "Zhang Guiba."

"The general is here!"

"Go tell those cannon fodders to lead the charge." Chen Ran pointed his whip at the grassland tribes that had been subdued and coerced into being cannon fodder. "Take care of their chiefs and nobles, and tell them that one hundred Shatuo heads will be exchanged for one life. Before dark, if each tribe fails to get the corresponding number of heads, all the chiefs and nobles will be beheaded!"

"Leader!"

It is useless to threaten ordinary herdsmen. They don't have much property, and many of them don't even have wives and children. The worst that can happen is that they can just run away and join other tribes.

If you want the cannon fodders to fight to the death, you have to threaten the leaders and nobles.

Sure enough, the shiny Tang sword was placed directly on their necks, and the chiefs and nobles became furious.

They didn't dare to fight Chen Ran, so they could only urge the warriors and herdsmen of their tribe to fight the Shatuo people.

It was a real fight of theirs, with thousands of light cavalry on both sides attacking each other in all directions, arrows raining down and horses piled up like mountains.

Li Keyong was so angry that he yelled "Despicable!!"

Using cannon fodder to consume the elite Shatuo cavalry is definitely a sure win for Chen Ran.

As for Li Keyong, it would definitely be a losing business with heavy losses.

But there is no other way. We have no choice but to fight a war of attrition.

"Wang Jingwu."

Chen Ran summoned his generals again.

"The end will be here."

"You go to the Qibi and Helian tribes in person and tell them to launch a general attack on the Shatuo people from the side and rear before dark. If they don't come, I will kill the Shatuo people and then I will attack them next!"

"Leader!"

"None of the Han men are superfluous." Chen Ran looked at the battlefield and whispered to himself, "Let you guys consume them all, and I will clean up the mess later."

Unknowingly, Chen Ran had established a very high prestige on the grassland.

He defeated the Uighurs, the Khitans, the Xi, the Bohais and many other grassland tribes.

He also adopted a cruel tactic that was even more brutal than the "Chopping off All with One Wheel" tactic, and all the tribes were terrified of him.

In the absence of a heroic leader to unify the grassland, the various tribes were afraid of Chen Ran's power and had to act according to his orders.

Before dark, troops from the Qibi and Helian tribes appeared behind the Shatuo people and immediately launched an attack.

The Shatuo people, attacked from both sides, were thrown into chaos.

It was not until this time that Chen Ran deployed the cavalry group in his hands.

"Hit Shandu, charge!"

By occupying Hedong, they obtained a large number of craftsmen, and by sending troops to Chang'an, they obtained another large number of craftsmen.

Chen Ran’s armament production capacity has been greatly improved.

This was reflected on the battlefield, when his Zhuangshandu cavalry was equipped with thousands of pieces of horse armor.

These armored cavalrymen, riding tall horses from the bitter cold of the Northeast, and both men and horses were armored, went into the battlefield after resting for a long time. They defeated the Shatuo people, who had been fighting for most of the day and were already exhausted, with a unstoppable force.

Seeing that the situation was hopeless, Li Keyong tried desperately to break out and escape.

In order to cover his escape, his adopted sons and foster sons, who later became the famous Thirteen Guardians. Of course, they were not enough in number, so they all covered his retreat and desperately rushed into the armored cavalry group in Youzhou Town.

A post-war inventory showed that all of them died in the battlefield, including Li Siyuan, the future Later Tang emperor, Li Sizhao who followed Li Keyong in his youth, Li Cunxin who was of Uighur origin, Li Si'en who was a Tuyuhun, and Shi Jingsi, a fierce Shatuo general known as the "White Robe".

In the end, only Li Cunxiao, who was known as "the king is no better than Xiang, and the general is no better than Li", took advantage of the cover of night and desperately protected Li Keyong to break through the siege and escape from the Tatars at full speed.

In this battle, Chen Ran's soldiers suffered little loss.

The number of casualties was less than 10%.

The ones who suffered the real heavy losses were the cannon fodder who were dragged along.

Some tribes were even completely wiped out, with only one in ten young and strong men left.

Regarding these tribes that suffered heavy losses, Chen Ran said that in order to reward their heroic fighting, they would all be relocated to various places in Youzhou Town.

A large group of old, weak and children, mainly women, came to the heart of Han territory. They were told that they would no longer have to suffer on the grassland, but they were destined to be swallowed up and digested in no time.

After all, there were many bachelors in Youzhou Town and Henghaijun Town. They married these women and raised their children as their own. When all the old men died out, the tribe naturally disappeared in the long river of history.

They were so cruel to their nominally own people, let alone the captured Shatuo captives.

In front of the various tribes, Chen Ran disposed of all the captured Shatuo soldiers and horses, numbering more than ten thousand.

The vast grassland was dyed bright red.

The Shatuo people, a military group that left a deep mark in history books, were swept into the dustbin of history by Chen Ran before they even began to prosper.

This is not the end. Chen Ran arranged for messengers to deliver messages to the Tatars regarding the escaped Li Keyong and his son.

"Either hand over the heads of Li Keyong and his son, or my army will come!"

(End of this chapter)