Chapter 150: “triple Kill” In The Midst Of The Game
At the end of the last year of the Shu Tian Calendar, in Hu City. Wu Fei, who had returned here, bit into a steamed bun while looking at the Northern Border map hanging high on the earthen wall, as well as the city defense map of Gu Shou Pass.
From the end of year 36 to year 37, over more than a year, Wu Fei and Zhao Cheng clung tightly to each other without either side slackening. Thus, Wu Fei had already discovered that Zhao Cheng had left Gu Shou Pass.
First, the Dragon Descendant pulled down Zhao Cheng’s flag; furthermore, after the peddlers and woodcutters bribed by Wu Fei entered the pass, the rigor of the soldiers in the city changed.
In the old military system, there was no standard drill manual, and after generals were replaced, many orders would not be conveyed smoothly.
Meanwhile, Zhao Cheng and the Dragon Descendant were drifting further apart, while instead making progress with the non-commissioned officer system under Wu Fei.
In other words, the Hao Army now has two systems. And the gap will grow larger in the future, because whatever Zhao Cheng wants to change, the Hao State Dragon Descendant elder faction will oppose it on the grounds of defending the “ancestral system.”
For this reason, Wu Fei began further probing, continuously transporting grain to the frontline fortresses. If Zhao Cheng were still there, there would certainly be a reaction from his rear lines.
However, no key information on Southern Region material mobilization was captured inside Gu Shou Pass.
Thus, in the twelfth month, Wu Fei issued a total mobilization order, beginning to concentrate the surplus grain from Huangyu City into the three fortresses. And he organized military farms as much as possible to the north. In this process, if Zhao Cheng were still there, there would inevitably be a reaction.
After all, over this year, both sides had gone through multiple confrontations. Zhao Cheng himself, to prevent Wu Fei’s sneak attacks via sea routes, had set up a series of grain stations, similar to the Crimson Serpent Mountain grain station when Wu Fei had just entered the military. These grain depots had earthen walls, and Wu Fei’s subsequent small-scale harassment battles from the sea were all blocked by these grain station defense points.
Of course, Zhao Cheng had also consumed quite a bit of labor conscripted from Yan Land to build these grain station depots.
Yan Land’s food and grass were already insufficient, but not building them wasn’t an option either. Otherwise, Wu Fei would bleed them dry comprehensively.
In this squatting pit situation, Zhao Cheng maintained the stability of the grain stations, which also exhausted the Hao Army considerably.
The Hao Army personnel guarding the grain warehouses on the Yan Land frontline worked day and night without sleep. Grain and grass could only be taken out with three procedures. After all, Wu Fei would trick the city and conduct infiltration.
But in the feudal era, this was already an extremely high management cost. Over time, it couldn’t be sustained. Once Zhao Cheng left, everyone slackened.
Wu Fei had also suffered quite a few losses from Zhao Cheng this year, such as in the eighth month when supplementing grain to a depot. A troop transporting a batch of grain thought it was foolproof, but the grain was intercepted, and four wooden ox and flowing horses were robbed by the enemy. The damage wasn’t great, but the humiliation was extreme.
After Wu Fei’s counter-investigation, it was determined that scouts along the way had leaked the secret based on his grain transport patterns. From then on, Wu Fei’s grain escort began adding random variables to the “departure time.”
Specific operation: When grain carts arrived at each depot and prepared for the next leg, they would irregularly stop for a few hours before moving, making Zhao Cheng’s “spies” uncertain of the exact time the grain would pass through. This in turn affected the planning costs of those raiders.
After all, even if raiders arrived early, they risked being discovered by patrol teams.
In surprise attacks, the specific operations greatly tested planning ability. If raiders could pinpoint the exact itinerary time of the target, the success rate would be immensely higher.
Wu Fei’s small change to the grain transport system completely cut off Zhao Cheng’s possibility of pulling this trick again.
Each time Wu Fei and Zhao Cheng made moves against each other, they seemed able to sense the solemn or amused smile on the opponent’s face when they made their move.
On the twelfth day of the twelfth month, Wu Fei made a final probe against Gu Shou Pass.
In the morning, Wu Fei dispatched a Dragon Horse troop, flying around Gu Shou Pass in a show of force parade, while sending green onions, ginger, and other Southern Region seasonings, placed at the foot of the city wall. He also left a letter saying: “The North is bitterly cold; eating hot pot in winter is truly one of life’s great pleasures. Your brother misses you, hence these spicy ingredients.”
The letter sent by Master Wu Fei seemed like correspondence between foodies, but it was actually probing words.
According to what Wu Fei knew, those Dragon Descendants differed culturally from the traditional Northern Barbarian Tribes of Da Yao; to reduce unnecessary impurities in their bodies, they rarely ate cattle and sheep, instead consuming fish and shrimp, shellfish, and other seafood. Additionally, some birds and the like.
However, live fish, shrimp, and similar foods were hard to preserve and required ice blocks; this noble diet wasn’t suitable for the military. Live poultry like chicken and duck also had transport and handling issues, unsuitable for supplying large armies. Large armies’ meat still had to be pigs and sheep.
Spicy seasonings paired with mutton, and mutton would cause strong body odor among officers and soldiers. This was the fishy mutton smell that Da Yao spoke of for Northern Barbarian Tribes. There were no shower gels these days, and Northern Region soaps were rarities. Now it could be confirmed that there were definitely Dragon Descendants at Gu Shou Pass. These lifestyle details—if Zhao Cheng were still there, he would certainly explain due to conflicts with Dragon Descendant habits, and not without reproach.
But if the reply beat around the bush~
Soon, Wu Fei received a reply. The letter from Zhao Cheng expressed great thanks for Wu Fei’s concern, but a child had just been born at home, so he needed to go back and see. He would return in just a few days.
In the camp, Wu Fei pinched this (AI-generated reply) letter and looked at it repeatedly, even studying the paper and the oxidation of the ink marks.
This was a “no silver here, three hundred taels” kind of response.
On the frontline confrontation zone, Wu Fei gazed at the checkpoint where the “man had already left,” his expression full of emotion.
Wu Fei knew that the opposite side’s Zhao Cheng was also wearing him down, waiting for Da Yao’s new monarch to deliver a knife to him, but Hao State this small country struck first. How to put it—as a “military strategist,” Wu Fei felt quite saddened by the death of a fellow rabbit and fox grieving.
He hadn’t defeated him on the battlefield, but solved him by waiting out the time.
…Da Yao changes reign era…
Tian You Calendar, January 25th, Eastern Market Army launches the offensive, the large army divided into three routes.
Among them, the right route troop was the three thousand elites brought by Wu Hengyu from the Northern Army, and to ensure future command integration, many Eastern Market Army non-commissioned officer generals were also among them.
Wu Fei’s idea for this allocation: This battle was to let these arrogant non-commissioned officers understand what courage that no ten thousand men could withstand is, so that Wu Hengyu could take over Bo Prefecture military affairs next.
The left route was led by Wu Fei himself, five thousand selected from the Huangyu City siege battle, who would synchronously surround Liu Gang Terrace, this high ground west of Gu Shou Pass, to prevent fire from harassing the side after Wu Hengyu scaled the wall first.
The final route was to go around the rear, the troop mainly the two thousand soldiers reorganized by Zhao Xian Zhong, with the task of cross-sea combat under the help of Dragon Descendant Yu Li.
…Gu Shou Pass’s dawn was silent…
The day before marching out, Dragon Descendant Huang Tao, guarding the pass, faced the admonition from checkpoint officials left by Zhao Cheng’s faction: “Should stockpile water and ice blocks to reinforce city defenses,” and refuted it.
Huang Tao’s mustache twitched slightly: “We are now in the dry season; the well water source is only enough for cart and horse expenses—how can we drain the pond to catch fish?”
The accompanying garrison officials wanted to advise further,
But Huang Tao drove him out of Gu Shou Pass, telling him to go west and follow Zhao Cheng.
Huang Tao faced the other arriving garrison generals and said with full official authority: “Anyone else who doesn’t want to serve under me, please resign yourselves.”
However, a few hours after Huang Tao killed the chicken to scare the monkeys, Gu Shou Pass’s rear line suffered a surprise attack; likewise Dragon Descendant Liu Yangtong, Huang Tao’s good friend, was beheaded in battle by Yao Army forces.
…Rear route cut first…
The first to engage the garrison was Yu Li’s unit of soldiers, but when she appeared on the battlefield, the psychological blow to the Dragon Descendants was greater than the military strategy blow.
Yu Li transformed into dragon form, pushing waves in the sea to make ship navigation extremely steady—compared to Zhao Cheng’s sneak attack with fast boats of about one hundred tons. The heavy ships escorted by Yu Li’s water waves were each five hundred tons. Their huge sails could be seen from afar along the coastline.
These large ships directly charged ashore amid waves like water hills, not fearing grounding at all, because Yu Li would gather water flow in the same way to let these large ships retreat back into the sea.
Over a thousand Yao Army thus landed swiftly. Hao State garrison general Liu Yangtong originally wanted to bring Dragon Horse Cavalry for a wave of surprise attack. After seeing the scene of huge waves surging giant ships and a group of people disembarking, he immediately returned to guard the depot. Thus, he didn’t see Yu Li lurking in the sea at first.
Yu Li transformed from dragon form to human form, jumped onto the sky boat, and commanded the large army toward the earthen wall fortress where Dragon Descendant Hao Army was stationed.
Rows of triple-stacked balloon-suspended sky boats hoisted Yanlin Rocket Launchers thirty zhang high in the air for a salvo. The barrier was blasted with numerous breaches.
After the bombardment ended, Yu Li jumped straight down from the sky boat, and under everyone’s gaze, amid flashing thunder in the sky, transformed from human form into a massive carp dragon. The Dragon Descendant corps momentarily thought it was their own garrison arriving, until the landing troops all came up and deployed to envelop from left and right, realizing it was the enemy.
Liu Yangtong’s troops thus counterattacked in confusion. When Yu Li charged over, two groups totaling 64 men of crane gun hand cannon companies fired rounds of blank shots, unsure whether to target this shape-shifting Dragon Descendant; however, when three-zhang water balls gathered above their heads and continuously turned into floods sweeping the horses and men within a hundred paces, they had no chance.
After the water balls disrupted the formation, cavalry charged in, and Zhao Xian Zhong descended from the sky swinging his blade at Liu Yangtong. This Dragon Descendant, at his final beheading, died with eyes wide open staring at Yu Li.
…Frontal assault also like thunder…
That day, Wu Fei led troops to arrive first at Liu Gang Terrace, holding a thousand mile mirror watching the distant panicked barrier construction. Facing enemies on the high ground, Wu Fei brought a great many cannonballs this time.
Eastern Market Army pushed out ox cart-pulled cannons. As cannon fire rang out, the Hao Army piling simple barriers on the terrace scattered in panic under the bombardment. The cannonballs easily blasted breaches in the barrier.
Then Wu Fei calculated the enemy situation, threw out the flag, and began the standard siege process: firearm soldiers advance.
On the high ground, Hao Heaven garrison soldiers could only crawl up at their commander’s call, raising knife shields to form a human wall at the breach to block.
But Eastern Market Army didn’t press directly up; instead, at fifty paces, they conducted a firearm salvo. After one rank salvo, the Hao Army blocking the breach suffered heavy casualties and withdrew into the barrier. Wu Fei confirmed these were laborer troops, but he had no intention of letting them go, ordering cannons prepared, then mobilizing armored soldiers to step forward.
The Hao Army terrace garrison general urged his soldiers to rally, but as they wore armor, ambushed near the terrace defense breach, waiting from above for Yao Army’s shield-topped armored soldier clusters to climb up.
Yao Army side armored soldiers, amid drumbeats and fireworks signal explosions, immediately circled back and retreated.
Simultaneously, Yao Army cannon fire rang out again, with explosive shells directly firing to the breach, projectiles bursting continuously at the breach, iron pieces scouring the ambushers like a storm.
At the breach, Hao Army were massacred by explosive projectiles, shoving each other to hide in pits, but those Hao Army who didn’t evade in time lay dead, piled layer upon layer outside the cover.
If Hao Army generals saw the Yao Army formation side, they would discover the Yao Army flags and commands here were so frequent, only Zhao Cheng’s command could match it!
Cannon fire ceased, Wu Fei micro-managed to press soldiers up again; at this point Hao Army helplessly sent men to the breach again, like monkeys being played.
Clearly Hao Army feared cannon fire; this time they sent a few to observe, but as soon as these few poked their heads out, they were killed by projectiles. Because this time it was Yao Army riflemen who fired.
After repeated beatings, Hao Army could only use war chariots filled with earth to block the breach, but these earth-filled war chariots were immediately wrecked by cannonballs, clearly unusable now, greatly reducing their ability to transfer city crossbows.
At this time Wu Fei wasn’t hasty, knowing this Liu Gang Terrace had many traps inside; the cost of breaking in was too high. With many troops, he took turns making offensive postures before the terrace, luring their projectile weapons to expose, and consuming the defenders’ limited energy.
Wu Fei was also waiting for Wu Hengyu; now the terrace was half-crippled enough, internal Hao Army unable to support Gu Shou Pass.
While Wu Hengyu’s side, as long as they breached Gu Shou Pass and seized mountain feng shui control inside the pass, Liu Gang Terrace cut off from water would become a dead zone.
The terrace garrison general was Zhao Cheng’s man, dispatching several waves of envoys to seek aid from Gu Shou Pass three li away.
Now this garrison general’s face was ashen as iron; of the three waves of aid envoys he sent, finally one returned, and the messenger shot and bleeding nonstop only brought one sentence: “General (Huang Tao inside Gu Shou Pass) tells us to hold firm.”
Gu Shou Pass, Huang Tao looked at the Wu Family large army around the western terrace, sighed, and said to the officers and soldiers: “Everyone, we must fight with all our might.”
…The sunset glow was filled with bloody magnificence…
In the camp surrounding the terrace, Wu Fei was looking at the situation on the sand table. The sand table was no longer crudely drawn on the ground with knife and sword by the commander, but made by the Staff Department based on comprehensive “various scouts'” observation and surveying information.
Wu Fei picked up Wu Hengyu’s letter. Wu Hengyu indicated he would bring cloud ladders and other equipment to arrive in two days, so he nodded.
Wu Fei’s large army began setting camp, this camp-setting divided into four major steps, each step’s teams acting per orders. This process, in over a year, Wu Fei had drilled the large army eight times, including not a few deductions of sudden situations.
This referenced modern fire drills: even if theory is memorized perfectly, in a fire, people panic, crowd congestion may occur, heading to places looking safe without fire but actually dead ends.
Xuan Chong’s modern experience: No one is proficient right away, especially large operations; without drills, in wartime it’s a makeshift troupe.
Wu Fei reviewed intelligence from internal espionage at Gu Shou Pass: large numbers of small cloth strips sent to horse stables, some cavalry beginning to blacken knives with charcoal.
Wu Fei also raised his head to look at the sunset glow, slowly saying: Sneak camp attack? I’ve previewed this question too.
If Zhao Cheng were there, seeing Wu Fei’s camp deployment, he wouldn’t sneak at all, but Zhao Cheng wasn’t there.
Wu Fei did a final patrol at dusk, checking oversights for the on-duty field combat teams; field combat team ambush spots were just a few steps from the fence.
Anti-night raid teams marked the ground every few steps, each acting independently without interference.
As Wu Fei expected, that very night, enemy cavalry from Gu Shou Pass sortied, trying to sneak camp while Wu Fei’s camp was not yet stable.
Without drills, if the large camp encountered cavalry at night, soldiers in each tent would wait in panic for “unknown numbers” of enemy cavalry.
But with drills, Wu Fei assigned three groups to entertain this wave. And these three groups had a systematic signaling system at night.
At midnight, as Yao Army scouts ran back quickly, urgently knocking three times on the pre-set wooden mallets outside the camp, and after ten breaths, knocking three times again; the camp immediately responded with the same three knocks twice.
Camp inside and out confirmed: the people sneaking out from Gu Shou Pass at night should not exceed two or three hundred.
Yao Army camp side had prepared hidden gates, for the several camp teams on night combat duty to enter and exit.
When enemy cavalry reached the camp front, this duty team quickly moved with bits in mouths, ambushing the must-pass road behind the camp.
These elite cavalry selected from under Huang Tao circled all night without finding a flaw, only to suffer a volley of crossbow bolts from the first group outside the camp; in haste over thirty riders fell. They panicked and fled back.
And when running back to within a hundred zhang of Gu Shou Pass gate, they were intercepted by another Yao Army group. Why didn’t this group act when Hao Army sortied? Because Hao Army night raid troops had high morale on sortie. And near the city gate, shouting would draw city reinforcements.
On return to camp, first ambushed outside Wu Fei’s camp, returning dejected and fruitless; now in the night hurrying home, clearly chaotic in haste.
As tripwires were pulled one by one, these raid cavalry panicked thinking surrounded by troops, fleeing in panic toward lantern-lit Gu Shou Pass city battlement.
Terrace high ground garrison heard their own troops’ sounds, exposing lights to receive.
While the third Yao Army crossbowman squad ambushed below the city battlement shot concentratively at silhouettes lit by Hao Army city gate firelight; the lights went out directly.
Thus in pitch black, this bunch of dismounted raiders at their own pass trampled and stomped dozens to death mutually.
If Huang Tao and Liu Gang Terrace garrison communicated well, this raid garrison could skip returning to Gu Shou Pass and head straight to the terrace. Of course, on the terrace side, Wu Fei had countermeasures.
…Xuan Chong’s evaluation of this Hao Army night raid: Courage commendable, come again next time…
After dawn, Wu Fei inspected these camp-raiding armored soldiers. Good grief, these thirty-one corpses all wore triple heavy armor: inner leather armor, chain mail, outer lamellar armor, with fine iron helmets. Ambush troops used heavy crossbows; last night three teams shot over five hundred arrows total, these bodies averaging seven or eight arrows each.
Nearby, the officer responsible for the ambush excitedly recounted: “Actually, if not for the night, if these armored soldiers pinpointed the ambush direction and charged, my crossbowmen really couldn’t beat them.”
Unfortunately last night was too dark; these Hao Army couldn’t see where the enemy was, and with the city gate right before them and orders to return without lingering, that’s how so many unlucky ones got arrowed.
Wu Fei pulled out an arrowhead, sniffed it under his nose, then suddenly flung it far away.—Then asked the night duty camp team: “Did you coat the arrowheads with poison?”
The camp team chuckled: “Yes, Marshal, brothers’ arrowheads were all soaked in golden juice.”
Wu Fei patted him, asking: “Night duty rule is to sleep with quiver as pillow; now the on-duty barracks smell very strong, right? (Wu Fei knew the whole barracks reeked like a cattle shed.)”
The camp team said smugly: “The relief brothers are cursing now.”
Wu Fei laughed and scolded: “You deserve cursing. Now set new rule: quivers under pillow can only be normal arrows; poisoned quivers must hang five steps left outside the tent. At night assembly, take turns retrieving your quivers. Everyone must blindfold drill several times daytime to familiarize each quiver position.”
Facing such patient behavior, Wu Fei, beyond tonight’s merit rewards, gave an extra 1 merit point each to the one hundred fifty who participated in the ambush.
One merit point equals merit for taking down one enemy full-armor warrior. Hmm, like in the 21st century, infantry squad knocking out a tank. In Wu Fei’s system, one merit point lets three generations enjoy thirty mu military fields, five spots within three generations; this spot lets descendants add twenty points in county official assessments optimally, five points in prefectural.
Wu Fei to nearby staff officers: Tonight’s counter-ambush, though total enemy armored soldiers killed less than seventy. But they showed courage in innovation and bold attempts in field combat—reward heavily!
Since hearing directly, after Wu Fei gave extra rewards, this squad of soldiers who returned at the gong call beamed with joy, shouting: “General is wise!”
