I did it all for the Han Dynasty!

Chapter 508 Is Your Sword Still Sharp?

Chapter 508 Is Your Sword Still Sharp?
Across the frozen Ji River, the armies of Han and Zhao gradually filled the gaps on both banks.

The seemingly impregnable natural barriers of mountains and rivers are as thin as a sheet of paper in the face of overwhelming human power. A gentle poke can completely overturn the red and yellow world into a mixed paste.

"Tsk!"

On the south bank of the Ji River, west of Lankao County, lies Baiyun Mountain.

It's called a mountain, but it's actually similar to other mountains in the Central Plains. It's just a small mound, only a dozen or so feet high. If it weren't for the legend that Zhang Liang, the Marquis of Liu, once lived in seclusion here, it might not have had a special name to give it.

But standing here is enough to get a general view of the battlefield.

The crimson dragon banner of the Han emperor fluttered here, and standing beneath it was Liu Miao, who had already moved here.

His red robe fluttered in the wind behind him, his hands were clasped behind his back, and his eyes were slightly narrowed.

"Yuan Shao can't hold on any longer."

"Otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to resist actually fighting me."

Behind Liu Miao, Jia Xu, Liu Ye, Pang Tong, Fa Zheng, and Chen Yu, who had returned from a trip to Qingzhou, all stood here with Liu Miao.

Will Yuan Shao really attack?

Chen Yu was still somewhat worried.

He couldn't understand military affairs.

However, standing here and seeing the endless ranks of soldiers on both sides, it is easy to feel powerless.

The thought that these two waves were about to collide, and that soldiers would be crushed and wiped out in the gaps between the two armies, made even a great scholar like Chen Yu feel a sense of fear.

These feelings left Chen Yu feeling both ashamed and confused.

he does not know.

Was it that those soldiers were braver than him, or was it simply because those soldiers were standing too low to see what he was facing?

"Will do."

Liu Miao stood with his hands behind his back, not even a strand of hair was out of place.

"Yuan Shao is definitely going to fight this time."

At this point, Liu Miao suddenly felt a pang of emotion.

"The bones of these people in the Yuan family are truly cut from the same mold."

"If the Yuan family were gone, the whole world would just go to hell! Tsk!"

Liu Miao then looked further north.

"I really want to see if Yuan Tan will heed my words after Yuan Shao dies!"

"..."

Chen Yu looked at Liu Miao helplessly: "Your Majesty, Yuan Shao is not dead yet."

"It will be soon. Otherwise, why would someone like him send a messenger with a letter asking me to have a detailed talk with him on the battlefield? He must be a dying man who has no one to talk to, so he has to come and nag me."

Chen Yu suddenly realized: "So His Majesty isn't going... because he finds Yuan Shao unlucky?"

"..."

Liu Miao suddenly wrapped his arms around Chen Yu's neck, punched him hard in the chest, and then laughed loudly: "You understand me! As expected of Gongwei!"

But Chen Yu rolled his eyes: "But I've heard that Your Majesty used to practice archery by writing my name on the target..."

"..."

Liu Miao showed no embarrassment whatsoever, instead punching Chen Yu hard again: "I wonder how someone abandoned me back then!"

Now it was Chen Yu's turn to feel somewhat resentful.

"Back then, who could have predicted all of this?"

At that time, the world was still divided between those who used force and those who inherited it; the nine provinces were collapsing, and the Han Dynasty was on the verge of collapse.

But now, Yuan Shao is almost dying of illness, the grass on Yuan Shu's grave is three feet high, and the entire Han Dynasty is also reborn from the ashes, almost on the verge of revival!

With such tremendous changes, why bother mentioning the past?

"cut!"

Liu Miao grunted, but unfortunately his words were drowned out by the sound of war drums that followed.

Chen Yu quickly changed the subject: "What happened?"

"That old bastard Yuan Shao is going to attack."

Liu Miao temporarily abandoned the idea of using strangulation to tighten Chen Yu's neck, and after releasing him, he turned his gaze towards the direction of the drumbeats.

"Get ready, it's about to begin!"

Upon hearing this, everyone behind him focused their attention on the front. Even Jia Xu, unusually, stood at the front, opening his eyes that were usually hidden under his eyelids and clouded vision.

This was Yuan Shao's desperate gamble!
Whether it will be a fight to the death or the Han Dynasty will completely seize the fate of the Northern Zhao and break its backbone, it all depends on the outcome of this battle!

The drums of the Han army also sounded.

Although the number of war drums made from alligator skin transported from Jiaozhi was less than that of Yuan's army, their sound was much louder and their momentum was much more powerful!
Zhou Yu stood at the front of the battle line, making his final strategic calculations.

"The battlefield is not just here."

"From the northeast, the General and Wen Yuan are leading cavalry to attack this place."

"In the southwest, Cheng Gong and Gongming have also joined forces and are attacking Yuan's army on the flank."

"In this battle, Yuan Shao is gambling, betting that he can defeat us before the other two armies arrive."

Now that the war has progressed to this point, both sides' generals are basically aware of the situation.

Yuan Shao, relying on the large number and high health of his army, completely abandoned the defenses on the east and west sides, and devoted all his military strength to the frontal battlefield.

This tactic involved using countless Yuan soldiers as human shields, gradually breaking them down, while desperately reaching Liu Miao's side on the front lines.

Whether the 200,000 Yuan troops scattered throughout Yanzhou would completely collapse, or whether Yuan Shao would fight with all his might and use his sword to slice Liu Miao's neck, that was the biggest suspense of the battle.

"You two!" Zhou Yu put on the demon mask again, a mask that made his own men tremble with fear at the mere sight of it.

"In this battle, we have only one objective!"

Sun Ce, Lü Meng, Lu Yi, Jiang Qin, Zhu Huan, and others stood before Zhou Yu, awaiting his next move.

"bass!"

The eight-sided Han sword at his waist suddenly roared like a dragon!
Zhou Yu slammed his longsword heavily onto the now-useless map on the table.

"With my Han sword, I will utterly sever the enemy's backbone!"

"Here!"

Sun Ce led his troops away first, and before parting, he nodded emphatically to Zhou Yu.

Zhou Yu responded in kind.

"Safe travels."

"We will definitely win this battle!"

Sun Ce left the camp and went straight back to the front line of the battlefield.

To its east and west were the followers of Jiang Qin and Zhu Huan, respectively.

He was at the forefront, facing Yuan Jun's vanguard—Zhang He and Gao Lan, two of the pillars of Hebei!
The drums reverberated.

The veins on Sun Ce's neck throbbed in rhythm.

"Father……"

Sun Ce didn't know whether Sun Jian would be satisfied with his current state if he were still alive.

But at least, being able to fight alongside Zhou Yu to restore the Han Dynasty and punish the traitors was something he was quite content with.

"The future of the Sun family should be written by me personally!"

Sun Ce raised his right arm and stared at the banner of the Yuan army charging towards him—

"Let's go!"

The morning sun was as red as blood, and the north wind howled.

The two armies faced off on the open plains of Yanzhou, their crimson and bright yellow banners fluttering in the wind, the characters for "Han" and "Zhao" embroidered on them, all of which turned ferocious at the same time.

Yuan's 30,000 infantrymen all wore short jackets covered with lamellar armor, and stood like a forest holding eighteen-foot-long spears, the tips of which gleamed coldly in a wave of silver light; swordsmen and shieldmen were hidden in the formation, their ring-pommel swords pointing diagonally at the ground, and the tiger head patterns on their iron shields were ferocious and ready to devour.

A sudden clang of gongs sounded on the south bank, and the red-turbaned Han army broke through the gaps like a tide, from which thousands of crossbowmen emerged, kneeling on the ground, waiting silently.

Zhang He, who was serving as the vanguard, did not look at the Han crossbowmen first, but looked into the distance, hoping to see the target of this battle, the crimson dragon banner that caused the Yuan army to suffer unbearable pain.

But when he looked up, all he could see was a vast expanse of sky and earth.

Even though it was a time when the two armies were at war and generals should not be distracted, Zhang He inexplicably remembered Liu Miao's "Hun Tian Theory," which seemed utterly absurd at the time.

"If the sky isn't flat and the earth isn't square, then the earth should be flat... But if the earth is flat, then why can't we see things in the distance?"

But a series of rapid crossbow clicks rang out, and Zhang He quickly regained his senses.

When Zhang He regained his senses, he found it strange that he could think of such a strange thing when a great battle was imminent.

Could it be that even he subconsciously believed that the Hun Tian theory was actually correct?

But if Hun Tian is right, does that mean Liu Miao is also right?

Zhang He was startled and quickly shook his head to banish these terrifying thoughts.

This is a major war between Han and Zhao! What am I even doing?
This was an opportunity that Yuan Shao had created with all his might, giving his army a chance to fight the Han army on a relatively level playing field, instead of crashing into the three mountains outside Pengcheng that the Han army had built into fortresses.

This battle is fair!
If we lose this battle again, then the Great Zhao will no longer have the courage to fight against the Great Han!
Zhang He took a few deep breaths to calm himself down.

"attack!"

Suddenly, Yuan Jun raised his blue banners, and his halberd-wielding soldiers roared a deafening battle cry. Heavy armored infantry, using their massive shields as walls, pressed forward, crushing the corpses of Yuan Jun soldiers who had died sometime earlier, their iron halberds tagged with the character "卜" (bu), until they were crushed.

The Han army, on the other hand, formed a fish-scale formation at the gate to meet the attack. The crisp sound of spears clashing together mingled with the cracking of bones. There was a soldier in a red turban whose belly armor was caught by a halberd, his intestines dragged out several feet, yet he still swung his sword to kill the enemy. There was also a captain in a yellow robe whose halberd was shattered by Su Tiehan's cold blade, his fingers and arms twisted into a mess, before he fell under the banner with the character "Han".

This scenario is not an isolated case.

For miles along, from the beginning to the end of the river, this is the scene.

"Your Majesty...look there, look there."

Chen Yu covered his mouth and suddenly asked Liu Miao to go see a place.

There, a gap appeared in the Han army's formation.

The reason for this gap was not that the Han army was defeated, but that almost all the Han troops present there had been reduced to fewer than 100.

"Your Majesty, aren't you going to send reinforcements?"

Beside Liu Miao were ten thousand imperial guards led by Zhou Tai and Chen Wu.

This was the only unit that Zhou Yu had no right to overstep, and also the only unit that Liu Miao could order to join the battle at this time.

But faced with Chen Yu's almost pleading gaze, Liu Miao resolutely shook his head.

"Don't go."

"Why?"