In my dream of returning to the Tang Dynasty, I snatched Wu Zetian from my lap.

"yes!!"

The crowd roared, and upon hearing the phrase "live or die together," a fierce glint appeared in everyone's eyes.

Under the tense and oppressive shadow of war, Dingyuan Mountain was quiet for about half an hour.

Then, the attack began!

After Chilenbajin arrived, he changed the attack strategy, reducing the number of men to 30 and adopting a more dispersed formation.

Firstly, it can avoid the rolling stone; secondly, it provides an opportunity to bloom in multiple locations.

This put immense pressure on Li Yuanchang. As soon as he saw the situation through his binoculars, he knew that danger was about to strike.

The sound of rustling footsteps continued from the mountainside as a large number of Xueyantuo people approached the maximum range of their bows and arrows. After a brief pause, a horn was sounded.

"Kill them!!"

Dozens of small enemy units launched simultaneous attacks from different directions, brandishing scimitars and charging forward with all their might.

"Fire the arrows!!" Li Yuanchang's voice boomed.

In an instant, war broke out again.

shhhhhh!

The crossbows fired rapidly, unleashing a barrage of arrows, but this only managed to slightly slow down the attack.

This time, the Xueyantuo people went completely mad. Their attack speed increased dramatically, and with better visibility during the day, they were no longer timid and hesitant.

"push!"

Boom!

One rock and log after another crashed down from the high point, their falling speed and inertia creating a bloody path in an instant.

The Xueyantuo soldiers who were hit either vomited blood or died on the spot.

Immediately afterwards, the Tang army charged out again, but were nearly caught by the Xueyantuo people.

The same tactics were clearly less effective in the second attack, or perhaps the Xueyantuo people were more cautious.

Li Yuanchang saw this and was very anxious.

The two sides engaged in a protracted tug-of-war on the rugged mountain roads. Unlike the large-scale battles on the plains, the terrain limited the fighting, resulting in more small-scale skirmishes and making it difficult to see any direct confrontations.

Many people tumbled down the hillside during the fighting.

When the Xueyantuo people finally managed to climb to a high point, intending to launch a coordinated attack and annihilate the Tang army, they discovered that the Tang army had retreated.

They retreated to another high ground and continued their ambush.

This was like waves, constantly neutralizing the Xueyantuo people's offensive.

The battle raged for two hours, and the outcome remained undecided.

In the third hour of the battle, the arrows were all used up, and all available logs and stones were used up. The Tang army's situation began to deteriorate.

The frontline commander on the Xueyantuo side seemed to sense this, and with a single order, a total of 1,200 men pressed forward from all directions, intending to take the city in one fell swoop.

From this point on, Dingyuan Mountain officially entered a crisis period.

Lacking tools and with their numerical disadvantage magnified, Li Yuanchang had no choice but to personally join the battle to halt the Xueyantuo army's continued advance.

At the foot of the mountain, a mountain battle broke out.

Li Yuanchang led a team of 67 men in a bloody battle against nearly 500 Tuyuhun soldiers, occupying the high ground and refusing to retreat, wielding Tang swords and hacking away at piles of corpses.

Li Yuanchang's helmet was chopped off, and his forehead was almost sliced ​​off. He single-handedly dragged ten Xueyantuo soldiers to their deaths, making him a true war god.

All his personal guards were wounded, but they refused to retreat even at the cost of their lives.

Immediately afterwards, Tu Sitong led all the archers to suddenly attack from the flank and reinforce Li Yuanchang.

The two sides engaged in close-quarters hand-to-hand combat. Some Tang soldiers were wounded and, before dying, grabbed enemy soldiers and jumped off the mountain, rolling down the slope and suffering head injuries and bleeding profusely.

Some Tang soldiers broke their swords by cutting, so they just bit them with their teeth!

Some Tang soldiers were cut down by scimitars, but before they died, they clung tightly to the legs of the Xueyantuo soldiers to buy their comrades some time.

A tenacious defense and a tragic battle took place on this little-known side battlefield.

As time passed, the fierce battle began to show signs of fatigue.

At this critical moment of life and death, all the wounded soldiers joined the battle. No one fled or surrendered; they all vowed to follow Li Yuanchang to the death.

Thus, the entire army, relying on an even more ruthless spirit and a fearless fighting style, successfully thwarted Xueyantuo's plan to capture Dingyuan Mountain in six hours.

The battle continued into the afternoon, the air thick with the stench of blood, and both sides suffered heavy losses.

The Tang army abandoned most of its positions and continued to shrink its defensive lines.

Severe physical exhaustion and wear and tear forced the victorious Chilenbajin to withdraw his troops.

But withdrawing does not mean the attack has stopped.

Amidst the smoke of battle and the corpses strewn across the mountaintop, a moment of tranquility was broken by the constant wails of Tang soldiers as they tried to stop each other's bleeding and apply medicine.

"ah!!"

Li Yuanchang gritted his teeth and groaned, his veins bulging, as he let the spicy distilled liquor wash over a cut on his arm.

That kind of pain was more painful than the knife wound itself.

But this was necessary, because in the era of cold weapons, soldiers often did not die in battle, but from wounds, and wound infection was the number one killer.

"call!!"

Li Yuanchang exhaled a deep breath, his head covered in sweat. He gritted his teeth, bandaged his wound, and put his armor back on.

"Your Highness, how are you?" Tu Sitong rushed over, panting.

Li Yuanchang grabbed a handful of berries and swallowed them, chewing them haphazardly to regain his strength.

"fine."

"How many men in the entire army are still able to fight?" He stood up, looked around, and saw that almost everyone there was wounded.

"Your Highness, we have suffered considerable losses, with our fighting force reduced to just over 170 men."

"All three brigade commanders sent people over to ask if we should break out, because if we don't, we'll miss our chance!" Tu Sitong said gravely.

Li Yuanchang's face was grave.

It wasn't that he was unwilling to break out, nor that he was overly benevolent or indecisive, but rather that breaking out would only lead to a quicker death, as the Xueyantuo cavalry were at full strength on the plains.

They were actually no good at mountain warfare.

Putting everything else aside, the warhorses were not even in the same class. The batch of warhorses that Wang Mai replaced were just second-class horses, which could not outrun the other side at all.

Breaking through is not advisable unless absolutely necessary; it's a last resort.

But in his view, it hasn't come to that point yet.

The Tang army suffered a crushing defeat, but the Xueyantuo suffered an even worse one, losing at least half of their men in the two attacks.

In ancient warfare, if a general lost even a third of his troops, let alone half, he would have to consider whether to retreat, let alone when the enemy was conducting infiltration operations.

They were also under great psychological pressure; if Tang reinforcements arrived, they would be completely annihilated.

"Hold on a little longer. If there's really no other way, we'll split up and break through. We'll do whatever it takes to survive!" he said in a deep voice, neither trying to be brave nor giving up.

Because of the need to break out in different directions, those who understand know that it's a matter of fate, and it's estimated that only a very small number will be able to get out.

It is estimated that Lantian County's granary will only have one title left.

"All right."

"Then Your Highness, go up and rest. I will take over and guard the pass. We will not let the enemy get up."

Li Yuanchang was about to say something.

"Report!!"

"Your Highness, there are envoys from the Xueyantuo tribe at the foot of the mountain, coming to deliver a message!"

Upon hearing this, Li Yuanchang frowned. An envoy? He quickly led his team to the front line of the position.