Hot flashes

That head belonged to Li Xun.

Cui Yin recognized the face because Li Xun's eyes were still open, wide open, and his mouth was slightly open, as if he had shouted something before he died. That sentence was forever stuck in his throat, dangling on the tip of the spear along with the severed head.

Zhao Ting slammed the gun down on the ground. The head on the tip of the gun rolled onto the snow, twirled twice, and stopped face up. The wide-open eyes stared straight at the night sky, at the snowflakes falling in a flurry.

A commotion broke out in the ranks behind Cui Yin.

The cavalry at the front reined in their horses, which slipped on the snow and collided with each other. The riders scrambled to steady their mounts.

Zhao Ting gave Cui Yin no time to react. He raised his iron spear, pointed it forward, and the cavalry formation behind him shot out like a crossbow with its bowstring released.

The iron hooves trampled the snow, and the splashed snowflakes danced in the torchlight like countless startled white butterflies.

The first two hundred riders of the Cui family tried to meet the enemy, but their horses had not undergone rigorous battlefield training and were intimidated by the enemy's momentum. Some turned around in place, some retreated backward, and some simply threw their riders to the ground, neighing and fleeing to the fields on both sides.

The moment the two cavalrymen clashed, the sounds of metal colliding, swords piercing flesh, screams, and curses blended into a chaotic cacophony, shattering the tranquility that should have been present on New Year's Eve.

The Cui family's private soldiers were not untrained, but their training was not on the same level as Zhao Ting's imperial guards.

The Cui family trained a "private army," which consisted of guards who trained behind closed doors in the manor.

Zhao Ting's Imperial Guards were veterans who had survived the battlefield; they were an iron army that had fought its way through countless battles.

The Cui family's private soldiers could form ranks, charge, and shout battle cries, but they had never seen real blood.

When the first rank of cavalrymen were stabbed off their horses by spears, when the first rank of infantrymen had half their heads sliced ​​off by sabers, when warm blood splattered on their faces, when the corpses of their comrades fell at their feet, and when the air was thick with the smell of rust, the same thing appeared in the eyes of those private soldiers—fear.

Fear is contagious. When a soldier throws down his knife and turns to run, the ten men behind him will run, and the hundred men behind those ten will run. The hundred men behind them don't even know what's happening; they just see the people in front of them running, so they run too.

The Cui family's 3,000-strong force had already scattered after Zhao Ting's first charge.

The officers brandished their knives and hacked through the crowd, trying to stop the rout, but the fleeing soldiers surged forward like a tide, pulling the officers back with them.

Some were pushed down, their feet sinking into the muddy snow, unable to get up again. In the chaos, some took off their armor and threw away their weapons, disappearing into the darkness as they mingled into the roadside woods.

Cui Yin was escorted back by his personal guards. His horse was startled in the chaos, its front hooves rearing up, almost throwing him off.

His guards held on tightly to the reins, and some stood in front of him, shielding him from arrows with their own bodies.

More hoofbeats came from afar. These weren't Zhao Ting's men, but two other imperial guards flanking from the east and west.

In that instant, Cui Yin understood—this was not a surprise attack, but a trap.

From the moment Li Xun opened the palace gates, from the moment Cui Jiawubao sent out troops, and even from the moment Han Zhang went south to Jiangnan a few months ago, disbanded his private army, and sealed off the fortified villages, it was all a trap.

The battle outside Deshengmen lasted for less than half an hour.

Of the three thousand men, more than three hundred died in battle, more than eight hundred were captured, and the rest scattered and disappeared into the vast snowy night.

Zhao Ting's men did not pursue them too far. Their mission was to surround the city gates, preventing anyone from escaping into or out of the city.