The simple and rude words did raise a lot of morale, and the soldiers marching in the evening sun let out a low light laugh, and some people began to take the food from behind the saddle to eat, and the food of the merchant army was actually quite good, canned or jerky, with cheese or water, there were things learned from the Mongols, and if there was enough time, the cooking cart might make broth and wheat cakes to make everyone eat a steaming good meal, and now it would be enough to fill the belly. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

"The style of painting is very familiar." Zhang Yansheng smiled at Lu Si.

He straddled the horse with his legs, opened a canned mushroom duck meat with his hands, and began to dig out the duck meat with a spoon to eat, the canned food is said to be complex, in fact, it is also a simple craft product, the earliest canned food of the merchant army is sealed with jars and cork encryption wax, and later sealed cans are made with tinned thin iron plates, the process is very simple, as long as you understand the principle, you can make canned food, including vegetables and various fruits, the army likes the production of this simple process the most, this invention not only solves the problem of food preservation, The key is to solve the problem of taste.

"Indeed." Lu Si was eating mutton jerky, drinking water, and said with a smile: "This reminds me of Commander Zhou." ”

"Look." Zhang Yansheng shrugged his shoulders and said, "We didn't go to the Lancer Regiment, and we didn't escape his clutches. I think Commander Zhou is afraid that he is going to be scolded. ”

"Is he a man who fears the rebuke of the people?" Lu Si's tone was light, but there was still obvious reverence. When he first arrived at the Lancer Regiment, he followed Lao Zhong and his gang, and at that time, Zhou Yao also squeezed their physical strength and spirit to the slightest, not to scold at that time, it is estimated that many people want to give Zhou Yao a shot in the back, and it is definitely not only the soldiers who want to shoot Zhou Yao's black gun, it is estimated that even many officers are playing similar ideas.

This time, the dragoon's dispatch was quite in Zhou Yao's style...... When you feel that your hands are heavy and you can't hold the fire, your feet are heavy and you can't take a step, your legs are worn out and bleeding, and your back is sore, the military order comes, and the next battle is still waiting, if you don't force yourself to lift your spirit, the result of a mistake on the battlefield is death.

This is not a simple training, this is a combination of training and actual combat, cold and ruthless, but absolutely effective.

Zhou Yao seems to be wielding a sledgehammer in his hand, constantly forging everyone, constantly stimulating people's potential, of course, there will be people who can't stand it on the way, and even innocent deaths, but Zhou Yao only has cold calculations in his heart, in his eyes, qualified elite soldiers, that is, official members of the Lancer Regiment are worth paying attention to, before that, it was just a string of numbers, the soldiers trained by the original Military Training Department may have been stronger than the Ming Army and the Northern Prisoners, but in Zhou Yao's heart, it was still nothing, The experience of fleeing from Salhu and Kaiyuan City was like a lingering nightmare in Zhou Yao's heart, if he felt that his subordinates were still not as elite as Dongyu, then no matter how many people died, the training would never stop.

At dusk, a crescent moon rose on the distant horizon of the steppe, and the light moonlight barely illuminated the way forward, and a large area of the steppe had passed, and now people walked along the valleys and rivers, and the cavalry were flanked by hills of different heights, and the mountains were like monsters crouching on the ground, waiting to be devoured. It belongs to the territory of Chicheng County in later generations, and there are many rivers in its territory, such as the White River, the Black River, the Red River, and the mountains are many, accounting for more than eighty percent of the area, and the plain land is less, and the rivers and mountains are the main landforms here.

In such a terrain environment, more than 1,000 people marched, and they also carried small artillery pieces weighing hundreds of pounds, which was also a big test for the marchers.

It was dark, hundreds of people lit torches, and with the ups and downs of the mountains, the walking army was like a fire dragon flying up and down, passing through the mountains, rivers, and grasslands.

Occasionally, you will also see sporadic yurts, or the Ming Dynasty abandoned here at the beginning of the post station, in later generations here most of the Han people, scattered grasslands were reclaimed into rural areas or built villages and towns, and at this time, everything is barren and chaotic, even those yurts have been abandoned, this should be the yurt of the herdsmen of the Karaqin tribe, when the crisis comes, many herdsmen follow Baihong Dataiji to evacuate urgently, and it is not uncommon to not carry felt bags.

Occasionally, the Chahar people can be seen sporadically taking advantage of the moonlight to reconnoiter on the line of control of the two armies, the autumn night is already very cold, these shepherds wear fur hats, wear light yellow jackets, and look far away on the horizon to this side, when they see a huge fire dragon galloping forward, these herdsmen are panicked, no one dares to stop, and they are eager to take advantage of the moonlight to ride their horses back, leaving only a hasty sound of horses' hooves.

On the battlefield hundreds of miles from north to south, the sentinels on both sides are innumerable, and Yusheng concentrated the cavalry strength of more than two cavalry regiments, plus a large number of dragoons fighting on horseback, the number of sentinels on the front line is also very sufficient, in order to eliminate reconnaissance, both armies are determined to block each other's sentinels from the main battle line, and even omissions are inevitable, and the strange thing called the Chahar people is that the merchant army on the opposite side is only interested in defense, so far there is no merchant army sentry cavalry deep into the defense line of the Chahar people, There seems to be no intention of a major counteroffensive.

"Someone in front of you stops!"

Hundreds of paces in front of the main force, the outpost of the first regiment and the second brigade of dragoons found a large number of cavalry galloping from the side front, and the other party was also marching along the riverbank, and the war horses stepped on the soft mud by the river, and the fishy smell of the mud soaked in the river was loosened, and the north wind blew over, and the people's mouths and noses were filled with the unique fishy smell of the riverside mud, coupled with the clear sound of horses' hooves.

As for the password, there is no way, if the army marches together and is stationed in the camp, it is natural to set the password after camping at night, and now the various departments are scattered along the battle line of more than 500 miles, and the soldiers are nearly 20,000 soldiers, plus tens of thousands of soldiers are also constantly mobilizing and cooperating, every day all the departments on the front are being sent by the military division or division commander Yang Sisun to adjust the garrison letter place, or move to engage the battle, at the current communication speed it is impossible to complete instantaneous communication, and the password is meaningless.

"We are a battalion of chasseurs."

The tone of the reply was full of confidence and pride, and even a little condescending. This feeling displeased the outpost officer of the dragoons, but he could not help it.

"Stay!" The dragoon outpost officer shouted: "I will report to the commander of our regiment." ”

"Oh, whatever you want." The other party did not restrain his arrogance because he heard the three words of the regiment commander, on the contrary, he still had a faint feeling of condescending indifference.

The two cavalry continued to flow forward in the moonlight, but one along the river bank to the north, the other along the river bank to the south, the two armies staggered half an arrow distance, staggered forward with each other, the dragoon outposts were on guard, but the chassars continued to move forward like water, marching along the river in a column of three, occasionally an officer would glance at this side, but only a glance.

The red cloak and blue military cap, the gray short military robe, the large cowhide ammunition bag on the chest is very obvious, the cowhide strap that kills very tightly is crossed on the chest, fixed at the waist, and there are short guns or daggers hanging behind him, short knives, and well-forged waist knives hanging from the waist, and on the left and right sides of the horse's belly are two long and short firearms, the longer ones are infantry guns, the shorter ones are cavalry guns, and there are also people carrying short short crossbows, broadswords, throwing guns and other close-range throwing weapons.

These chasers are almost armed to the teeth, and most of them are not wearing protection, or only wear a piece of chain mail in their military robes, and the concept of the chasers is that there are not too many weapons, and the protection can be simple.

In addition to individual weapons, the most eye-catching is a large number of small artillery carried with the army, the most important is the small Franco cannon and the tiger squat cannon, the tiger squat cannon is the most outstanding representative of the small firearms of the Ming army, as long as the materials are exquisite and carefully manufactured, the power and use of this small artillery is still very qualified, after loading the medicine bag and tamping, fill a large number of five-dollar heavy lead bullets, in about 60 steps, this small artillery shot shot is very powerful, at least much larger than the firearm, and the impact point is scattered, the barrage is dense, and the lethality is very amazingThe main thing is that the Franc machine gun can be loaded with multiple sub-guns at one time, and it is also a shotgun, and the effective range is farther than the tiger squat gun, both kinds of guns are very light, and there is no need for a gun carriage, the tiger squat gun gun only has a barrel and an iron-cast curved bracket, and the bracket can be put on the front end of the gun barrel in wartime, this small cannon weighs only thirty-six pounds, and it is one of the sharp weapons used by the Qi family army to defeat the enemy in those years. The small Franc machine weighs more than 100 catties, a mother gun can bring five to nine guns, every time the enemy will finish all the guns, basically a battle is over, due to the large tolerance between the guns and the belly of the gun, the poor closure, this Ming Dynasty Ministry of Industry has made a large number of artillery has been completely replaced by the Hongyi cannon, before that, the northern Ming army at least tens of thousands of such firearms fished out of the Portuguese shipwreck, but the more coarse the later the casting, the larger the tolerance gap, the less powerful the firing.

The Franc machine carried by the chaser battalion was cast by Li Zhuang himself, and he had bought a lot before, but he found that the quality was uneven, and the maintenance was very laborious.

Both kinds of artillery are tied to horses to carry it, when the cavalry marches, a large number of horses carrying artillery directly follow the march in the horse team, two tiger squat cannons are only more than 70 catties, a Franc machine is also about 120 catties to 150 catties, a horse can be easily camel transported, no effortless feeling.