The emperor would rather have a

Chapter 120: Come and practice with this general?
The next morning, the troops marched according to the established plan, with Wang Changgong and Zhang Jianxiong leading a thousand soldiers in the vanguard.

Before noon, the vanguard troops had captured two camps of the Shu army, and the speed of their advance was beyond imagination.

The Jialing River flows continuously in the valley, and the faint sound of fighting mixed with the sound of "gurgling" water flows down the river, echoing among the mountains.

On the exposed riverbed, cavalrymen carrying messengers galloped back and forth, reporting to Li Yi the military situation ahead. The main force of the vanguard had stopped marching, waiting for the battle situation of the vanguard.

"Originally they said it would take three days to capture the Huangniu and other military camps, but now it seems it won't take that long... If we're quick, two days should be enough?"

Li Yi turned to look at Li Hanchao, who was riding beside him, a smile on his face. Although he had anticipated that the Shu army's frontier camp would be easy to attack, he was naturally pleased to see such rapid progress.

Li Hanchao also laughed and said, "Last time, the Shu army's camp was completely defeated by the Fengxiang garrison troops. This time, with the elite troops of our imperial guards joining the battle, they will be even less likely to be able to stop us."

"Report!" At this moment, a messenger galloped up to Li Yi, dismounted, saluted, and reported, "The vanguard has captured two Shu camps and is preparing to attack the third. Commander Wang and Commander Zhang have both requested permission to lead their troops in the lead attack!"

"What's going on?" Li Yi frowned slightly. "Didn't they let the two groups of troops take turns attacking?"

According to the plan made last night, Wang Changgong would lead the first command to fight the first wave, and then Zhang Jianxiong would lead the troops to fight the second wave. The two would advance in turn. Why are they fighting now?

The messenger replied honestly, "After Commander Wang led his troops to capture the first camp, he left less than a hundred men to guard the surrendered Shu soldiers, and then led his troops to directly attack the second camp..."

After the messenger finished explaining the situation at the front, Li Yi finally understood the reason. It turned out that according to the original plan, Wang Changgong was responsible for the first wave of attack.

But this guy probably felt that the battle was going smoothly, so he didn't wait for Zhang Jianxiong to arrive behind him, but took advantage of the victory to continue attacking the second camp.

By the time Zhang Jianxiong and his men arrived, the second camp had already been attacked. The matter was already done and Zhang Jianxiong could not say anything.

However, before Wang Changgong had enough fun, he started arguing with Zhang Jianxiong. Neither of them could convince the other, so they could only send someone to ask Li Yi for instructions.

"Damn it, Wang Changgong treats my words as bullshit, right?" Li Yi was angry and amused, and couldn't help but curse.

These warriors are indeed very capable in fighting, but they can't even walk when they see military merits. They still have some bad habits in their bones.

"Let Zhang Jianxiong attack the third camp!"

Li Yi immediately ordered, "By the way, tell Wang Changgong that if he continues to be greedy for merit and advance recklessly, he won't be able to come back. Bring me his head!"

Fighting fiercely is one thing, but disobeying orders is another. Considering that Wang Changgong captured two camps of the Shu army in a row, Li Yi did not pursue him, but this kind of habit of acting on one's own must not be tolerated.

"Yes!" The messenger immediately mounted his horse and rushed to the front to deliver the message.

……

Just as Li Yi had expected at the beginning, the Shu army's forward strongholds were weak in manpower, and the vanguard troops used their strength to defeat the weak, and the progress was very smooth.

The first battle took only one day to capture four camps of the Shu army.

In order to prevent the front army from causing trouble, Li Yi sent someone to convey a strict order: Shu soldiers who surrender will not be killed, and those who violate this order will be dealt with according to military law.

He issued this order, on the one hand, to tell the Shu army that as long as they surrendered they would have a way to survive, and to prevent the Shu army from fighting to the death and refusing to surrender, thus causing unnecessary casualties to the Zhou army.

On the other hand, he also harbored a somewhat selfish motive: after all, the Zhou and Shu armies were both Han Chinese. Fighting each other was merely a civil war; why bother to kill each other? Of course, such remarks would dampen the morale of the troops, so Li Yi kept them to himself, stating only that he wanted to leave the Shu army a retreat route, thus reducing the difficulty and pressure of his own offensive.

It was getting dark.

Li Yi led the main force to rush to the four captured Shu army camps. The first three camps were fought without much effort, but the Zhou army suffered a small loss in the battle of the fourth camp, Huangniu Camp.

Because Huangniu Village was built in a gap in the mountain stream, it has an excellent geographical location and is built with a simple stone wall. Although it is only a little over one person high, its defense is definitely much stronger than other military villages with only wooden fences.

Moreover, the scale of Huangniu Village is slightly larger than other military villages, with more than 200 soldiers stationed there, almost twice as many as other military villages.

Among the casualties of the vanguard, nearly half were lost during the attack on Huangniu Village.

Fortunately, we have captured Huangniu Village, so the remaining four Shu army camps will not be difficult to defeat. If nothing goes wrong, we can completely clear them out tomorrow.

As night fell, the army began to set up camp, and Li Yi was busy arranging logistics workers to transport the wounded to the rear.

As for the soldiers who died in battle, they could only be buried in pits dug on the spot. After all, the war was urgent and the Shu Road was tortuous and difficult to travel. The living were covered in dust and dirt, so how could they have the energy to care about the dead?

If I could just dig a hole and bury it, I would have done my best...

Li Yi brought his personal soldiers to inspect the situation of each unit along the way. The mountain road was rugged and narrow, so the army could only camp in a long line, which was several miles from beginning to end.

Moreover, most of them could only camp on the riverbed, and the main road had to be left for people and horses to walk on.

Just as Li Yi turned a corner, he heard a group of people sitting around a campfire in front of him, warming themselves and chatting. From a distance, he could hear a loud voice talking.

"You don't know, those Shu soldiers are all cowards. This morning, I led my men to attack the first military camp, but after a while, they couldn't hold out. We rushed into the camp and attacked everyone we saw. After a while, those Shu soldiers were scared into throwing down their weapons and surrendering...Haha!"

"By the time our men in front had taken down the military camp, the men behind us hadn't even seen a glimpse of the Shu army. Seeing that there was still quite a while until noon, I decided to lead my men to attack the second camp."

Wang Changgong glanced at Zhang Jianxiong beside him and chuckled, "When General Zhang brought his men to catch up, our first commander had almost destroyed the Shu army's second camp."

"If you ask me, this Shu army is truly vulnerable. They're far inferior to the Khitans and the Han army! One of our Imperial Guards could easily defeat ten of them..."

Compared to Wang Changgong's excited look, Zhang Jianxiong who was sitting next to him was much more low-key, chewing on dry food without saying a word.

However, he was really impressed by the fighting ability of the imperial guards. The last time he attacked Shu, he led more than 2,000 people and it took him several days to capture the Shu army's camp.

But this time, the Imperial Guards took the lead in the first battle and captured two in just half a day. Moreover, through his observation today, the Shu army's camp had strengthened its defenses after the last time, and there were more troops stationed there than last time.

At this moment, a cold voice suddenly rang out: "Commander Wang is quite capable, you can beat ten men on your own, right? Then Commander Wang, come and practice with this general?"

Everyone immediately turned around to look, but they didn't know when Li Yi and his personal soldiers came closer.

"Greetings to Li Du Yuhou!" Everyone stood up and saluted.

Wang Changgong was also startled, but he put on a flattering smile and said, "Li Du Yuhou is the bravest of the three armies. Even the Han army's most powerful general is no match for you. Fighting the Khitans is like beating your grandson... Hehe, asking me to fight you is like asking for my life."

(End of this chapter)