When Hu Songyue learned the content of the battle report, his heart was shocked. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

The battle report was sent to the capital, but it was the news that a large number of Tatar cavalry had been found in Zhangjiakou at Zhangjiakou Fort in the north pass of Xuanfu Town, which was an emergency war report.

Hu Songyue thought to himself: "Fortunately, it's not Xuanfu Town, it's only in Zhangjiakou Fort, even if the Tatars break through Zhangjiabao Pass, it will take five or six days to kill, and there is enough time to withdraw to Juyong Pass!" ”

Before, Hu Songyue wanted to go to see Shen Xi and mention the matter of camping and resting in place, but after learning about the battle report, he realized that Shen Xi's judgment was not groundless, and the Tatars were likely to be worried about Xuanfu Town at this time.

If the main force of the Tatars appeared in the area around Xuanfu Town, with the current combat effectiveness of their own men and horses, there would not even be a 10% chance of victory.

On the night of September 22, the soldiers and horses led by Shen Xi were still marching, and the speed was surprisingly slow, and it was not until the second watch that the group arrived at the northern suburbs of Huailai County.

Shen Xi did not let him continue on his way, because at this time the army was exhausted.

After receiving the order to camp and rest on the spot, many officers and soldiers set up their tents and went straight to sleep, not even eating dinner, let alone going to the nearest river to wash up.

Even Shen Xi himself was sleepy, so he fell asleep on the blanket after entering the sleeping tent, without even taking off his clothes and pants. He was ready that if there was a warning signal at night that the Tatar cavalry was approaching, he would no longer return to the Shiju Yong Pass, but directly garrison the county seat of Huailai.

In the case of the Tatar cavalry approaching, if there is not even a wall, Shen Xi really doesn't know what the chances of his team are, even if the trapped beast is still fighting, the final result is to kill the neck, in order to avoid being hated and retaliated by the Tatars, it is better to wipe the neck directly, maybe you can leave a whole corpse.

Fortunately, nothing happened that night, and the next morning, Shen Xi got up very early, ordered the whole army to eat dry food, and then pulled out the camp again, and the officers and soldiers complained bitterly...... Marching fifty miles a day seemed to them to be unreasonable at all, as if Shen Xi was deliberately tossing them.

The speed of the army's retreat was still not fast, Shen Xi personally supervised, patrolling back and forth in front of the team, but with little effect, the soldiers should not leave or not, even if they were whipped with whips, they still looked half-dead.

Half a day passed in a blink of an eye, and at noon, after leaving Huailai County for about twenty miles, a fast horse suddenly reported that this time it was not the fast horse that came to report the news from Xuanfu Town, but the scout sent by Shen Xi to spy on the news.

The scout's expression was obviously a little frightened, and when he saw Shen Xi, he almost rolled off his horse, rushed to Shen Xi, who was standing on the side of the road to supervise the progress of the officers and soldiers, and stammered, "Big ...... My lord, the big thing is not good, there are a large number of Beiyi cavalry, who are rushing in the direction of Huailai, and it is only eighty miles away from here! ”

"Huh!?"

Shen Xi frowned suddenly, this joke was a bit big, the Tatar cavalry came as soon as it was said, and it was only eighty miles away in an instant?

Hu Songyue was lobbying Shen Xi to slow down his march, and when he heard the news, he was shocked and asked, "Is this true?" ”

"The military newspaper doesn't dare to say half a word!" The scout knelt down and saluted.

Hu Songyue suddenly became nervous, and continued to ask, "How many people are there in Beikou?" ”

"General Huihu, I don't know the number of soldiers and horses in Beiyi for the time being, but they are all cavalry, and the dust is raised along the road, which should not be less than a thousand!" The scout replied.

Shen Xi frowned: "I didn't expect it to come so quickly, it seems that it is too late to withdraw to Huailai County!" ”

"What did you say, my lord? Even if Beiyi kills it, it is still eighty miles away from here, and it should be too late to withdraw to Huailai County...... There are many Tatar soldiers and horses, and only by entering Huailai County can you ensure peace of mind! Hu Songyue looked frightened, and as for the words that made Shen Xi slow down his march before, he didn't say a word.

Shen Xi shook his head: "The fast horse report is faster than the Tatar cavalry's advance, but it is only a little faster, and I estimate that the Tatars are only forty miles away from us at most...... This place is already twenty miles away from Huailai County, you say that from here to the north, we are getting closer and closer to each other, do we go to Huailai County first, or do the Tatar cavalry catch up with us first? ”

Hu Songyue opened his mouth wide and didn't say a word, not to mention that the distance here is twenty miles, even if it is only ten miles, in the case of walking in the opposite direction, it will not be faster than the Tatar cavalry running twenty miles.

"My lord, what should I do?" Hu Songyue was extremely nervous.

Shen Xi pinched the horsewhip, shook it to the ground, raised a puff of dust, and shouted: "Order, the three armies immediately speed up and retreat eastward in the direction of Juyong Pass, and be sure to find a city fortress that can be relied on to garrison before the Tatars catch up!" ”

Hu Songyue pondered for a moment and said, "My lord, then you can only return to your arms, otherwise you will ......."

Halfway through the words, Hu Songyue couldn't go on.

Because there are still twenty miles to Huailaiwei, at the current speed, it should not be possible to enter Huailaiwei. However, there is another choice on the way ahead, but this choice can only be made in desperation, because it is the civil fort that humiliated the Ming Dynasty decades ago, made Yingzong "hunt in the north", and put the Ming Dynasty in danger.

After the "Tumu Fort Change", which remembered history, the fortress had long been deserted, and now it is only used as an ordinary post station on the post road.

Decades have passed, and the Fort is dilapidated, with only troops from the Local Inspection Department stationed in it, and after the large-scale fighting in the northwest, the Fort is now empty.

There is no need for Shen Xi to mobilize this time, just like when Shen Xi took Song Shu and others to Yansui Town to send artillery and heard that the Tatars were chasing after him, the officers and soldiers only hated their parents for having two legs at this time, not to mention the baggage, they didn't even want weapons and armor, and they were ready to take off their armor directly and "go into battle lightly", but instead of the front of the battlefield, they joined the camp of deserters.

Shen Xi absolutely did not allow these soldiers to abandon their weapons and equipment, in any case, these things were the capital to ensure that they could get out safely in the end.

Shen Xi would not give up any means to save his life, even if he gave up the three armies now and fled to Juyong Pass alone, he would not be able to enter Juyong Pass before the Tatar cavalry caught up.

"Lord Shen, or throw away all those artillery, firearms, bows and crossbows, and ammunition!"

At the critical moment, Hu Songyue, Liu Xu and others began to come over to find trouble again, and these people were buzzing in Shen Xi's ears like flies.

Shen Xi said angrily: "Losing those cannons and bows and crossbows is equivalent to losing your lives, do you want to die under the Tatar iron horse?" ”

Hu Songyue said: "But my lord, with those things dragging us down, we have no chance to retreat to Huailaiwei before Beikou arrives!" ”

Shen Xi sneered: "Even if we don't have those artillery, we compare the speed with the Tatars, and the two legs with the four legs, there is a chance?" With weapons and equipment, especially those cannons and guns, we have at least a chance to live, since we can't reach Huailaiwei, let's go to the civil fort! ”

Hearing Shen Xi say that he was going to Tumubao, Hu Songyue, Liu Xu and others were about to collapse.

What is the Civil Fort? That is the place that was nailed to the pillar of shame of the Ming Dynasty, even after the restoration of Yingzong, he did not plan to rebuild the civil fort, but only built the Xianzhong Temple in it, but fortunately, the civil fort is more than twenty miles away from Huailai County, and it is only a few miles away from their current location.

"My lord, do you want to think about it again?"

Hu Songyue, Liu Xu and others all came over to persuade, "You can leave the infantry for defense, and withdraw your troops to Juyong Pass at the speed of cavalry, maybe you can reach Juyong Pass before tomorrow morning!" ”

Shen Xi looked at Hu Songyue and a few other generals, and secretly thought, I think it's very beautiful, let someone else come to your palace, can you escape back to Juyong Pass with the cavalry? You don't have to carry the responsibility afterwards, waiting for me to carry it?

Don't even think about such a thing!

Shen Xi said: "The three armies are advancing and retreating together, and if anyone says anything about the cavalry withdrawing first, they will all be dealt with as disturbing the morale of the army." Have you ever thought that even if the infantry is left behind, how many of them will stay where they are against the Tatar cavalry? Didn't they think the head on their necks was too steady to hold the Tatars' sharp blades? ”

Hu Songyue and others were speechless.

Obviously, if the infantry is allowed to stay, the final result will not be that these people will fight against the Tatars, but that they will flee separately, and they will not play the role of the queen of the palace at all.

Without these people to delay the time of the Tatars, even if they rode horses, they could not outrun the Tatar cavalry at all, because according to the rules of the Mongols, the expedition was often a person, two horses or even three horses, and the horse could be changed at any time, but the Ming side used a horse to the end. When the horsepower is exhausted, not only will you end up dying, but you will die very badly.

"Lord Shen, I heard you say, you must be stationed in the Civil Wood Fort?" Hu Songyue asked anxiously.

"Enter!"

Shen Xi no longer talks nonsense with these people, now it is important to save his life, and he is not qualified to pick and choose. It is good to have the civil fort as a fortress to guard, it is only a few miles away, and after entering the civil fort, there is still an hour or two to rest, set up artillery, and build a defensive line, Shen Xi even feels that there is still a chance to win this battle.

The Franc cannon has become an ornament in many fortresses in the Ming border pass, because they do not know how to use new artillery, even if there are gunners trained by Zhang Laowu and others, but there is little or no practice in ordinary times, and the technology is also very poor, and there is no clear understanding of the performance and firing of artillery.

Who is Shen Xi, he is the one who introduced and supervised the manufacture of the Franc cannon, it was he who promoted it, and it was after the great success of the actual combat application that the Franc cannon was gradually equipped with the border fortresses.

The effectiveness of these eighty Franc cannons in Shen Xi's hands is not comparable to the ordinary garrisons of the city fortress.

The army trotted all the way, and under the supervision of Shen Xi, no one dared to leave anything behind, and walked all the way forward for a few miles, and finally came to the front of the civil fort.

Originally, the soldiers were very worried, because when they marched to Xuanfu, they thought that the fortress was really dilapidated, but when they returned, they were chased by the Tatar cavalry, but they felt that this condescending fortress could be used as a refuge in the back garden.

The civil fort is built on the high mound of more than 600 meters above sea level, there is a drop of about dozens of meters with the surrounding plain, its shape is roughly ship-shaped, the fort is about 500 meters long from north to south, about 1,000 meters long from east to west, the city wall is six or seven meters high, and it can really play the role of shelter and protection at a glance.

Unfortunately, not only the officers and soldiers had this idea, when Shen Xi and his entourage of about 8,000 people arrived, there were still a group of "uninvited guests" stranded in the Tumu Fort, and these uninvited guests were refugees who had fled from all over the northwest and migrated to the capital.

Shen Xi did not pay much attention to the troops passing by the civil fort before, and at this time the troops were withdrawn to be stationed in the civil fort, only to know that although the civil fort is now deserted, many of the refugees who went to the capital settled in the civil fort, and the number of refugees soared from Shen Xi's initial estimate of three to five hundred, although it was not counted in detail in the end, but Shen Xi roughly estimated that the number of refugees in the fort exceeded 10,000. (To be continued.) )