kvmb Chapter 118 The 1st Victory
Chapter 118 The 1st Victory
After leaving the city, Lu Cheng looked back at the city wall behind him, and then looked at the more than forty cavalrymen around him.
In fact, these cavalrymen were not real cavalrymen, and many of them were at best infantrymen on horseback.
But no matter what, it is good enough that these people are willing to follow me out of the city and face those brutal Jiannu Tartars.
All things are difficult at the beginning. If you take this first step well, everything will be easy afterwards.
"Brothers, since you are willing to come out with me, I can't guarantee anything else, but as long as we encounter an enemy, I will be the first to rush forward."
Ding Xiu immediately shouted, "I'm the second one."
Immediately, a general flag shouted, "I'm the third one."
"My fourth..."
Lu Cheng turned his head to look at Ding Xiu and nodded with satisfaction.
The reason for bringing Ding Xiu along was to let him take the lead.
"Come with me!"
"Yes!"
More than forty cavalrymen galloped on their horses, raising a trail of dust, and headed towards the North Gate.
More than a month ago, when Lu Cheng and Xiong Tingbi were still in the capital, Nurhaci led his army to attack Kaiyuan City. Ma Lin, the general of Kaiyuan City, led the soldiers and civilians in a tenacious resistance, but were ultimately defeated and were captured by Nurhaci.
Afterwards, the Later Jin army entered the city and launched a massacre. In the two guards and one city of Kaiyuan alone, more than 10 soldiers and civilians were massacred or looted.
By the end of July, Tieling was also captured.
If the Later Jin army continued to attack southward, Shenyang would be their next target.
At this time in Shenyang, the combined forces of Li Ruzhen and Li Guangrong amounted to only over 10,000, of which only over 2,000 were capable of fighting. He Shixian's situation was better, as he still had 2,400 capable soldiers among his several thousand soldiers.
All the combat-capable soldiers in the entire Shenyang Zhongwei added up to no more than 5,000 people.
The situation in Liaoyang City south of Shenyang was better. There were still 20,000 to 30,000 miscellaneous soldiers in total, but these 20,000 to 30,000 soldiers had no armor and no firearms. Even the middle and lower-level officers such as the captains and battalion commanders in the army were all dead or fled, and they could not be commanded at all.
It can be said that the entire Liaodong front has collapsed.
Fortunately, after Nurhaci captured Tieling, he did not continue to move south, but went to solve the problem of the Yehe tribe in the north, which made the Shenyang side feel relieved.
But the Yehe tribe at the north gate will certainly not be able to hold out for long.
Once the northern gate was breached, the 5,000 combat-capable soldiers in Shenyang would certainly not be able to stop Nurhaci's tens of thousands of elite troops.
While attacking the Yehe tribe, Nurhaci had also been paying attention to the situation in Shenyang and Liaoyang. He sent a large number of scouts to be scattered between Tieling and Shenyang, keeping an eye on the movements of the Ming army at all times to prevent the Ming army from going north to support the Yehe tribe.
After Lu Cheng led his men to leave Shenyang City, Xiong Tingbi had already ordered the three generals Li Ruzhen, Li Guangrong and He Shixian to reorganize their troops and go forward to bluff.
However, Li Ruzhen and Li Guangrong were obviously unwilling to go out of the city to meet the enemy. Faced with danger, they hesitated until the next day before leading their troops to the battle.
He Shixian, who was stationed at Hupiyi, led his troops to the north as soon as possible. However, Hupiyi was sixty miles south of Shenyang, and it would take time to reach Shenyang.
Moreover, these three armies are mainly composed of infantry, and their speed is naturally not as fast as Lu Cheng's small cavalry.
When Lu Cheng led his men out of Shenyang and headed north for more than ten miles, they discovered the first wave of Later Jin scouts.
Even Lu Cheng did not expect that these Later Jin scouts would be so bold. Only seven or eight cavalrymen dared to go to Shenyang to investigate the situation.
The moment he spotted the other party, Lu Cheng urged his horse forward without hesitation.
When the seven or eight Later Jin cavalrymen saw that Lu Cheng had forty or fifty people on his side, they did not dare to be arrogant and turned around and ran away.
Once the enemy ran away, the cavalrymen behind Lu Cheng were no longer afraid. The number of people on their side was more than five times that of the enemy. How could they not be able to defeat them with five against one?
Everyone urged their horses to catch up, especially Ding Xiu, who caught up with Lu Cheng as soon as he charged.
As the distance between the two sides shortened and they were within the range of the bows and arrows, Lu Cheng clamped his legs around the horse's belly, took out two bows, drew the bows and shot arrows at the last Jiannu soldier.
With a "whoosh" sound, the first arrow missed the target.
After all, Lu Cheng had only been practicing archery for a short time, and he was now moving at high speed on horseback, so it was naturally impossible for him to hit the target with one shot.
Lu Cheng was not discouraged and continued to urge the warhorse under his crotch to rush towards the opponent faster.
Lu Cheng's warhorse was also specially selected, and its speed was quite good, so he quickly closed the distance.
Seizing the opportunity, Lu Cheng held his breath, drew his bow and arrow again, and aimed at a Jiannu.
With a "swoosh" sound, the arrow missed its target a little this time, but still hit an enemy's horse.
However, Lu Cheng aimed at the Jiannu soldier who was running at the back, but ended up shooting the second to last one, and hit the warhorse's buttocks.
Lu Cheng used a double-stone bow, and the arrow was so fast and sharp that half of the long feathered arrow went into the horse's buttocks. The horse wailed and threw the cavalryman off its back.
The last cavalryman dodged hurriedly, but Lu Cheng seized the opportunity and shot another arrow. This time, Lu Cheng aimed directly at the last cavalryman's horse.
But after the arrow was shot, the cavalryman turned around, and the arrow deviated a little and hit the man in the waist.
The cavalryman fell off his horse directly. Because of the pain, he was still holding the reins in his hands and was dragged by the horse for more than ten steps before he fell off.
Although the archery skills were a bit off target, fortunately 3 out of 2 arrows hit the target. Lu Cheng was very satisfied.
Seeing that he was about to rush to the cavalryman who was thrown off his horse, Lu Cheng directly hung the bow on the horse and pulled out the goose-wing knife.
The moment he approached the slave, the long knife drew a graceful arc and slashed through the slave's neck. Blood gushed out like a small fountain.
As for the Jiannu who was shot in the kidney by Lu Cheng, he was already dying at this moment. Lu Cheng had no time to care about him. He urged his horse to chase after the rest of the Jiannu.
The remaining Jiannu noticed that Lu Cheng had distanced himself from the cavalry behind him, and immediately turned around and shot arrows at Lu Cheng.
The bows used by scouts are generally short bows. Long bows cannot be used on horseback, which is not conducive to shooting arrows. The arrows shot by short bows are naturally less powerful.
When the arrows flew to Lu Cheng, they no longer had much power and were simply blocked by Lu Cheng with his sword.
At this time, Lu Cheng no longer used the bow, but kept closing the distance.
Due to the delay just now, Ding Xiu also caught up.
Ding Xiu didn't know how to use a bow and arrow, he just chased after him with his Miao Dao.
Soon, Lu Cheng and Ding Xiu flew up to the last Jiannu almost at the same time. That Jiannu had already drawn his sword and was ready to fight.
Lu Cheng slightly turned his horse and went around the cavalryman, leaving him to Ding Xiu.
Ding Xiu immediately understood what was going on. Relying on the fact that his Miao Dao was much longer than the opponent's scimitar, he swung the sword and directly cut down the Jiannu cavalryman.
At this time, Lu Cheng finally caught up with another cavalryman, and with the same lightning-fast sword strike, he knocked the cavalryman off his horse.
Only half of the eight cavalrymen were left, and the rest, seeing that they could not escape, simply turned around and attacked Lu Cheng.
Although Lu Cheng's riding skills were still a little unfamiliar, he used his strength to hold the horse's belly steadily. He swung the goose-wing knife in his hand again and chopped the man out with the knife.
When Lu Cheng faced the next enemy, Ding Xiu had already dealt with the previous enemy and caught up with him.
Lu Cheng and Ding Xiu easily dealt with a few Later Jin cavalrymen.
By the time dozens of cavalrymen behind them caught up, Lu Cheng and Ding Xiu had already stopped the horses that wanted to escape and were ready to clean up the battlefield.
"See? These Later Jin Tartars are easy to kill. Ding Xiu has killed two of them."
After seeing the bravery of the two men, the dozens of cavalrymen were all excited. Someone took the lead and shouted, "You are mighty!"
"My lord is mighty!"
After everyone finished shouting, Lu Cheng smiled and pressed his hand down: "Alright, alright, what's so great about that? Aren't they just a few Tartars? Clean up the battlefield quickly, collect the money, armor, and weapons from the Tartars, and divide the money!"
The crowd immediately cheered and ran everywhere, stripped all the Tartars naked and gathered all the war horses together.
Unfortunately, one of the war horses was shot by Lu Cheng, and the injury was quite serious.
Lu Cheng simply gave the order to slaughter the war horse and cut up the horse meat to use as military rations.
Afterwards, a total of fifty or sixty taels of silver were found on the eight Jian slaves, all of which were small change.
Lu Cheng gave a direct order: one tael per person.
These cavalrymen who followed along received silver without doing anything, so they naturally became excited and began to look forward to encountering the next wave of enemies.
At this moment, Lu Cheng took out another ten taels of silver and waved it in front of everyone: "Ding Xiu killed two enemies before, according to the rules, he will be rewarded with ten taels. Ding Xiu, it's yours."
"Thank you, sir!"
When everyone saw the ten taels of silver, their hearts were moved. This was ten taels of silver.
Even if you are a general, your annual salary is only a dozen taels, which is almost half a year's salary.
From this moment on, the heads of the Tartars have become equated with huge piles of silver.
The next time we encounter the enemy, people will rush forward without Lu Cheng having to do any battle mobilization.
The first small-scale victory has begun to inspire the courage of these cavalrymen to fight the enemy.
Afterwards, Lu Cheng ordered the heads of these Tartars to be chopped off and hung on a warhorse.
Then, Lu Cheng turned around and looked at everyone: "Whose warhorse was running slower just now? These Tartar warhorses are pretty good. You can change to a faster horse, so that you won't be unable to catch up when you go to grab the heads."
"My, I need to change horses."
"Give it to me, I want to change..."
"Alright, alright, I'll take care of the distribution..."
The first fire has been successfully lit.
All that's left is to lead them from one victory to another...